


A Tale of Two Sandis

by aksarah



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: F/F, Gender or Sex Swap, Rule 63
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-10-11
Updated: 2016-12-06
Packaged: 2018-04-25 19:43:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 43,548
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4973653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aksarah/pseuds/aksarah
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sandra Pines attended West Coast Tech. Sandi Pines worked in the "entertainment" industry. It was a decade before the twins girls from New Jersey saw each other again in Gravity Falls. “Two Sandis” Rule 63 (most characters genderswapped) AU "Fiddauthor" and "Starla".</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I was writing something with Stanford Pines, and as a female, I wondered how different his life would have turned out if he were female. Given that he was born c. 1953, would she feel the same about her deformity? About her twin?

_“A stubborn tough New Jersey Native, Filbrick wasn't too creative._

_He didn’t have two twin names handy, so he just shrugged and named both Sandi”_

 

**_Inertia:_ ** _the tendency for a body in motion to keep moving with the same speed and same direction unless an external force is applied._

**_Fate:_ ** _The presumed cause, force, principle, or divine will that predeter_ _mines events._

 

_“Because she is afraid of not being supported, (a woman) unknowingly pushes away the support she needs.”_

_― John Gray, Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus_

 

**Chapter 1**

 

**Gravity Falls, Oregon - Summer, 2012**

            Sandra “Sandi” Pines (aka Missy Mystery) was under arrest. The Mystery Shack, her tourist trap home, crawled with government agents. Her niece and nephew, Dipper and Abel had been taken into child protective services and would be shipped home. She used her one phone call to contact her Gal Friday, Sues, and tell her to guard the vending machine with her life.

            She was so close, after thirty years of waiting, only to have everything ruined at the eleventh hour. She slouched against the railed back of the metal chair she was cuffed to and tried not to think about how much her back hurt. Not until her crappy digital watch beeped to alert her of another gravitic pulse, did her spirits return. Escape would be tricky, but she knew she had the skills needed to pull this off. Sandi scoped out the room and her eyes lingered on the bulletin board behind her, littered with snippets from the life of Sandra Pines. She chuckled darkly at the agents’ misconnected suppositions. “Ok, Pines. You can do this. Remember your training.”

            In a few minutes, she got the opportunity she was looking for. The agents wanted to move her. She started coughing, _very_ convincingly. Thanks to years of being a heavy smoker, Sandi could really hack. The agents kept their distance, waiting out the ‘attack’. The watch chirped and she sprang into action. She had slipped out of the cuffs about ten minutes prior and had time to plot her every move. Using the chair as a battering ram, she easily swam through the room, knocking the surprised men to the side and snagged an agent’s wallet, another’s cell phone, and another’s side-arm as a little bonus on the way out.

            Once she’d paid a taxi to lead the agents on a wild goose chase, she hiked up her skirt, did a couple deep-knee bends and hoofed it for the shack. Only minutes remained until the zero hour.

.x.

            Sandi let out an exasperated laugh when she saw that the agents that had carpeted the property were now absent. She’d been planning what to do to get around them as she ran, but there was no need for evasive maneuvers, now. She sprinted the last few yards to the house and nearly threw up when she saw that the vending machine stood open. No Sues—no kids. They could be in only one place.

 

            Sandi screamed as she watched her niece Dipper make to shut the portal down. The girl stopped but shot a heart-broken, angry look in her direction. They argued and fought over control of the shut-down button. She couldn’t blame them for thinking they way they did, but there wasn’t any time to explain. The seconds were ticking down. Dipper screamed at her brother, who had managed to claw his way back to the button, to do it—to ignore his soft heart and listen to his head. Sandi’s own soft heart felt like it was being torn from her chest. “Am I really such a bad gal?” she pleaded with Abel.

            “Grantie Sandi…” Abel sniffled and let go. “I trust you.”

 

            In retrospect, Sandi would laugh about the fact that she had cranked the portal to maximum power. She didn’t know any better—that was the setting that she felt would give her the best results. When the shockwave generated by the portal’s aperture opening all the way hit them like a ton of bricks she panicked thinking that the thing had self-destructed. The dust cleared, small fires burned here and there, and through the haze they saw a figure emerge from the now ruined portal.

            Dipper pushed herself up onto her hands and knees and gaped “What…? Who is that?!”

            “The author of the journals…” Sandi muttered as the woman who approached them pulled a pair of heavy goggles off, revealing a familiar face. “My sister.” Sandi spread her arms wide and stepped confidently up to woman in black. “Finally! After all these long years of waiting, you’re actually here! _Sister!”_ She stopped a few feet away and hesitated when the woman didn’t budge or change her stern expression. “Sandra?”

            Abel raised a brow. “Um, what the heck is going on?”

            Dipper hugged Journal Number Three to herself tightly. “ _Sandra_?”

            Sandi sighed melodramatically and dropped her arms to her sides. “My twin sister, Dr. Sandra Pines.”

            Abel clutched his sister’s arm. “Is this where one of us passes out?”

            “On it!” Sues chimed and crumpled to the floor.

            “Sandi?” Sandra whispered, narrowing her eyes. Her face was nearly identical to her sister’s save the dimple in her chin and she wore her brownish grey hair long, tied up in a messy bun. “You… _you_ did this?”

            “Well, your last words were, and I quote: ‘Sandi! Help me! Do something!’”

            She frowned more deeply. “And you just decided not to heed my warnings about how risky it would be to start this thing up?” Sandra motioned to the destroyed, still smoking portal.

            “You bet your ass, I did.”

            “You wanted me back _that badly_?”

            She rolled her eyes. “Ya know, of all the scenarios I dreamed up of what this day would be like, Sandra, this is _not_ what I imagined.”

            Her long lost other half made a strange, almost embarrassed face, stood where she was, cocked a brow, and put her hands on her hips. Where the gesture would have set Sandi on edge when they were teenagers—prepared her for the rational-no-fun-level-headed one of the pair to dump a wet blanket on an otherwise exciting situation—she grinned back like a simpleton, riding the high of her accomplishment. “Here it comes,” she whispered.

            “Why are there young people down here with us? Seems kind of reckless, Dee.”

            “And there it is,” Sandi chuckled. “Well, it was a little nutty and I’ll explain later, but the tall one there is my employee, Susan S. Ramirez—call her Sues. The kids are Shermy’s grandkids, Dipper and Abel.”

            Abel grinned, stepped forward and extended his hand as Sandra dropped to one knee to get a better look at them. “I have a niece and a nephew?” She shook his hand.

            “Whoa! Six fingers! That’s a whole finger friendlier!”

            Sandra chuckled in the same cadence and pitch as her sister, albeit with an audible weariness. “Well, he’s definitely related to you, Dee.”

            Dipper looked from the journal in her hands to the woman in the black trench coat and started to hyperventilate. “The author… of the… journals… is my…relative? Grantie Sandi, what the heck?!” Her brother pulled her inhaler out of his pocket, stuck it in her mouth and gave it a squeeze. Reflexively, Dipper held the breath and calmed down. Abel nodded knowingly and gave her a comforting pat on the back.

            Their attentions were diverted by the sound of men’s voices coming from the surveillance system in the control room. Sandra jogged over to the monitor and gaped at the sight of her home surrounded by men in suits and flak jackets. “What the hell is going on out there, Sandi?”

            “Huh. Guess they caught up with the decoy.” She put her hands on her hips and shrugged. “Welp, we’re boned.”

            Sues hovered between the women and gawked at the monitor. “Oh my gosh I left the vending machine wide open! I forgot all about those guys!”

            “So very, _very_ boned.”

            “Forgot…” Dipper whispered and pulled her backpack off of her shoulders. “H-hey, I think I have something that might help!” She removed the Society of the Blind Eye ray and held it up, but before she could explain to the adults in the room what it was and what it did, Sandra snatched it from her.

            “How did you get this?” she asked breathlessly. The look of frightened concern on her great-aunt’s face left Dipper speechless. “No, never mind. I don’t want to know right now. I think I can…” she muttered, turned away from them and went to the surveillance console. “…and augment the amplitude with the…” Sandra deftly stripped some wires, twisted and grafted then did some tests, totally ignoring everyone else around her.

            Sandi smiled wryly as she watched her sister work. “Give her a minute,” she said, patting Dipper on the head. “She’s in the zone.”

            The agents on the monitor mentioned that they thought there was a doorway hidden behind the vending machine. Sandra glanced up, satisfied by the data her instruments displayed. She dialed “Pines” into the memory-sealing gun. “That should do it. Everyone, cover your ears as completely as you can! Fire in the hole in three, two…” At ‘one’ Sandra pulled the trigger and a loud, high-pitched pulse blasted them and everything around for a square mile. She watched the monitor carefully, hands pressed tightly to her head until she was sure the ray had worked as she hoped. “Everyone ok?”

            Sues pulled her fingers out of her ears with a resounding ‘pop’. “Think so. What did that thing do?”

            Sandra jogged back to the monitor again. “It would appear by their staggering around and jibbering that it worked.”

            Abel craned his neck to see around the adults. “They’ve forgotten about us? That’s awesome, Grantie Sandra!”

            _“Grantie?”_ She asked and raised a brow at the boy.

            Sandi put an arm around her shoulder. “Short for great-auntie. Cute, huh?”

            Sandra seemed too nervous for a hug and shrugged out from under her sister’s arm. “Sure,” she said. “Don’t celebrate yet. The agents are just milling around. We’ve still got to get rid of them or they’ll start to wonder why they’re here.”

            “Ooh! I know, I know!” Abel waved his arm as if wanting to be called on in class. “We can do what we did to that Blind Ivan guy!”

            “Yeah!” Dipper chimed. “He was super suggestive after he got blasted. We just need to come up with a good story.”

            Sandi Pines adjusted her fez and grinned wide. “A good story, huh?”

 

            Moments later, Sandra stood on the deck, looking fairly authoritative in her black clothes and utility belt, and barked orders at the confused agents. She waved a few sheets of paper covered in Abel’s fanciful crayon drawings in one hand and managed to convince them to hand over the data on their case to her. In under ten minutes, the agents had hastily retreated. Just as the children had said, the effects of the memory ray left them highly open to suggestion. Once they were gone, Sues slipped away to call Wendell and tell her co-worker all about the ‘other Sandi’. The younger Pines twins were both anxious to learn more about their mysterious, long-lost great-aunt, but her sister had other ideas. Sandi shooed them away, telling them to get some rest. Dipper was the most disappointed, as she had a billion questions for her. Her brother seemed a little more understanding and took her by the shoulders as they went inside to get ready for an early bed.   


            Sandra took a deep breath and listened carefully. The only vehicle sounds were the distant, constant, hiss of normal highway traffic, and she could no longer detect helicopter blades, either. Letting the breath out slowly, Sandra looked around at the yard, the signage, the totem pole covering her public address tower, and balled her hands into fists.

            “You must be tired,” Sandi said softly, but it still made her sister jump.

            “No, not really.” Sandra turned to go back inside, but hesitated.

            “Are you ok?”

            She pivoted to face her. “Yes and no. I’m great because I’m standing on my porch and I’m not in any immediate danger of being killed, but I’m also very concerned about the portal’s activation and I won’t be able to sleep much until I do some damage control down there.”

            Sandi nodded. “You, uh… you any _better_ than you were?”

            She knew exactly what she meant. The last time they’d seen each other, Sandra was what could best be described as ‘unhinged’. “I’m about ninety percent,” she said quickly and clenched and unclenched her hands rapidly. “Nowhere near as paranoid, anyway. Now I have _legitimate_ reasons to be terrified.”

            “Sandra…” Sandi reached out to put her hand on her shoulder, but Sandra stepped off the porch and headed for the gift shop door.

            “I should probably get a shower and start working.”

            Sandi followed her into the house. “You don’t wanna just grab a beer and catch up?” she asked with a hopeful grin.

            “Sandi, if you learned anything about the portal, you’d know I can’t relax just yet. Please, understand. If I don’t do something there could be catastrophic consequences, not just for Gravity Falls but the universe as we know it!”

            “Sure, Sand. I get it.” She lowered her chin and stared at her sister’s boots as they retreated from her toward the gift shop. They were dusty and damaged, like the long black coat she wore.

            “Good,” Sandra said with a wave over her shoulder without slowing her pace. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” She stopped as her sister’s hand clapped down on her shoulder.

            “Wait. You can’t fool me. You’re about to fall down, Sandra. You’re gonna get cleaned up, get some food in you, and you’re gonna promise me you’ll get some damn sleep. I don’t care if you sleep till _dinner time_ tomorrow, but I just spent thirty goddamn years trying to get you back and if you drop dead now, I’ll kill you!”

.x.

            Dipper listened at the door to their attic bedroom with a glass pressed to her ear for a few minutes. “This doesn’t work as well as you’d think,” she said, giving up and making a face. “All I heard was something about Sandi wanting to kill Sandra!”

            “Dipper, relax. You’ll make yourself nuts speculating about what they might be saying. Give ‘em some space. It’s been _thirty years!”_ He used his stuffed plaidypus as a sort of puppet and waggled its arms as if it were talking.

            “Oh yeah? If you hadn’t seen _me_ in thirty years, and you didn’t know until I walked through that portal if I was even still alive, and then bam! There I am! And I didn’t even give you a _hug?_ How would _you_ feel?”

            Abel put the stuffed animal down. “Oh. Yeah, I guess that’s kind of dumb, huh.”

            “Abel, promise me we won’t ever get stupid? No matter what junk happens to us?”

            Her brother smiled and hugged the plaidypus tightly. “Well, I’m pretty stupid already.”

            “Not any more stupid than I am,” Dipper smiled sheepishly, thinking of the way she’d behaved in the basement earlier in the evening.

            “Goodnight, stupid,” Abel giggled.

            “Goodnight, stupid,” Dipper replied, stared up at the ceiling and hoped that tomorrow would be a better day.

.x.

            Sandra froze and a few tense seconds passed before she shuddered, turned around and nodded. “Sorry, Dee. I’m just not used to anyone looking out for me.”

            Sandi stared into her sister’s matching, worried brown eyes, pursed her lips and nodded back. “Go get a shower. I’ll make you a sandwich.”

            “Ok,” Sandra relented. “Sounds good.” She gripped the lapels of her coat in her oversized hands and went around the vending machine toward the bathroom.

            “Sandra,” Sandi called after her. She stopped and looked over her shoulder, brows pinched. “Welcome home.” Sandra nodded slightly and continued on her way. When she was out of earshot, Sandi frowned and scoffed lightly. “Thanks for rescuing me from some Mad Max sci-fi apocalypse dimension, Sandi,” she muttered and trudged to the kitchen make her sister a sandwich. “Damn it. She hasn’t changed _one bit_.”

 

**Glass Shard Beach, NJ - 1971**

            Sandra Pines had been so excited after the talk with the guidance counsellor that her twin sister Sandi painted her face with a proud grin and did her best to hide her anxiety from her, but the fact that come late August her best friend would be off to her new school loomed large. Sandi Pines meandered slowly back from the beach, her sister’s words still ringing in her ears. _“You’ll have to come visit me on the other side of the country!”_

            Sandi overheard what the councilor said about their respective prospects. “... ‘Only make a good wife and mother’,” she muttered to herself as she trudged home. Sandra had run ahead, saying she wanted to check on her science project one more time before the big day. She was only a few blocks away, but already the distance between them was great. Sandi’s heart twinged thinking of the day she’d wake up in the room they shared, alone, and it tightened as she imagined Sandra, still sleeping on the west coast waking a few hours later and feeling the same way. She imagined her trying to study, but gnawing on her pen, worrying about how her twin was faring without her. “She will, that softy. She’s gonna make herself sick worryin’ about her poor, stupid, lonely sister back East.” Sandi made a face and paused. “But not if I do somethin’ about that!” She changed course for the school.

 

            “Sand? You in here?” Sandi called, her voice echoing into the gymnasium. She was of average height, but wore tall, white go-go boots. Today she sported a cute little one-piece outfit with half-length sleeves and hot pants in red and white with a large black belt. She was, proudly, the more fashionable of the pair. She walked around the exhibits and stopped at the two submitted by the Pines twins. She must have missed Sandra by a few minutes. Her perpetual motion machine hummed along, spinning around. Next to it was a toaster with a wire coat hanger stuck in it labeled “Dryer-Bot 1000”, professing to dry your clothes in ‘three seconds flat’. “If I wasn’t such a dumb-dumb...” Sandi sneered and kicked her table with her boot a little too hard. It banged into the neighboring table, dislodging a piece of Sandra’s machine. A small amount black smoke puffed out and Sandi screamed. “Oh no! Nonono! Sandra! Your big chance!” She reached out toward the thing, but froze. She did not begin to know how to fix it. Sandi turned and ran.

 

            In a few blocks, she caught up to her sister. “Sand! Saaaaand!” she screamed, waving her arms and stumbling in her go-go boots. “You gotta come quick! I broke it! Oh God, Sandra I broke it!”

            “Sandi?” Sandra asked, startled by her sister’s appearance. Her mascara was a blotchy mess. Sandra was nearly identical to her sister, but in style, completely different. She wore her hair long and her clothes were decidedly more hip _pie_ than hip _ster:_ a white embroidered tunic top and plain knee-length skirt with heeled clogs. The teenager hugged a large crocheted purse in her overlarge hands—her freakish six fingers tucked around it and pressed protectively to her chest. She wore large, round glasses which she pushed up her nose as she stared at her twin. “Broke what?”

            “The gizmo, Sand! Come quick!”

            She set her jaw and nodded and they ran back to school together.

 

            It was still running when they arrived, but the vent cover that had fallen off remained on the table. “Sandi Pines you scared me to death!” Sandra swatted at her. “The cover’s just come off. You could have duct-taped it back in place.”

            “No!” Sandi cried. “There was smoke!”

            Sandra twitched. “Smoke?”

            Her sister told her what happened and showed her exactly where the smoke came from and in a flash the girl had her purse open and tools splayed out on the table. She pulled wires, capped, twisted, tucked, metered, checked, checked, and double checked. “Sandi,” she said gravely, wiping her forehead and replacing the tools in her purse. “You are a life saver!”

            Her twin gave her a look like her head was on fire. “Wha...?”

            She proceeded to explain something that went entirely over the less technically-savvy girl’s head, but punctuated it with a huge hug. “If you hadn’t bumped it, the failure could have gone off over night and it would have stopped dead! Imagine those guys from West Coast Tech coming all the way out here and this thing is a dud… oh man. You saved me, Dee!”

            Sandi blushed and hugged her back, laughing nervously. “Yeah, totally planned it that way.”

            Sandra smiled kindly on her sister. “Come on, let’s get home. It’s Wednesday—Prince Spaghetti day!”

            “Can’t wait!” Sandi chimed back, her forced smile making her face ache.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The sisters split and we meet Carl McCorkle and a perky young co-ed called Juniper Hatfield...

**Glass Shard Beach - February, 1972**

            Sandra’s acceptance letter from West Coast Tech arrived on a very cold, clear day only a few days from Valentine’s Day. The family celebrated with dinner out (a rare occurrence) and Sandi smiled through the entire affair. She was very proud of her twin’s achievement—that was a given. She was glad that she’d be where she could be happy amongst nerds like herself. She’d be fine. As long as Sandi could make her plan work, Sandra would be fine.

            That night Sandi brushed her teeth and tried to think about anything but the future, but it confronted her in everything she saw—two toothbrushes in the holder, two towels on the hanger. She returned to the little room they shared where her sister was braiding her hair for the night at the dressing table. Sandra wore a placid smile, glowing with thoughts of the future and the wonderful meal they’d had. When she saw Sandi’s reflection her happy expression fell. Sandra finished her braid and put her hands in her lap. “Sandi, can we talk?” she asked, looking up at her.

            “Sure, Sis. What’s up?” Sandi leaned on the doorframe and tried to seem aloof. She wore a cute set of pajamas, a little too mature for her eighteen years. Sandra stood. She wore a matching set of pajama pants and button down shirt in blue plaid flannel. Pushing her glasses up, she cleared her throat. “I’ve been thinking about the future.”

            Sandi groaned and moved past her to flop down on the bottom bunk. “Come on, Sand, don’t be such a drag.”

            “I’m serious, Sandi.”

            “Exactly!” Sandi waved her hands at her. “ _Relax_.”

            “I don’t mean _mine_.”

            She let out a long sigh and let her hands drop on either side of her. “Fine. I’m gonna get married. You don’t have to worry. End of discussion. Goodnight.”

            Sandra was on her feet now. “That guidance counselor was a male chauvinist pig!”

            “Yeah, well, so’s our dad, in case you weren’t aware.”

            Sandra spread her arms out. “You can be anything you want!”

            “I’m workin’ on it, ok?!” The tone of Sandi’s voice was no longer friendly.  “Do _not_ worry about me!” She glared back at her sister for a beat then rolled over to face the wall.

            Sandra stared at her for moment then let her arms fall to her sides and climbed the little ladder to the top bunk. “Ok. I won’t,” she lied. “Goodnight, Dee.”

 

**Meadowvale, Ohio - April, 1972**

            Nineteen year old college freshman Juniper Hatfield walked from the science building on the campus of Backupsmore University to the apartment she shared with her husband with a spring in her step. She hummed to herself and occasionally let a manic giggle escape, causing more than a few heads to turn. Her pace quickened as she grew closer until she was at a full run, hiking her skirt up a little so that she could widen her stride as she leapt up the stairs two at a time. When she burst in through the door, her posture changed dramatically as she was greeted with an unexpected sight. Her husband Bert was home in the middle of the day. He was sitting in front of the television with a can of soda in his hand.

            “Bert!” Juniper exclaimed. “You’re home early!”

            “Yeah.”

            “Everything alright?”

            He leveled his gaze at her. “Why not?”

            “Oh, just that, you’re usually at work and…”

            “What? You fixin’ to cheat on me while I’m away and I surprised you?” He growled, voice raising.

            “No! Sakes no! Of course not!”

            “Then why you jumpier than a long-tailed cat in a room full a rockers?”

            She lowered her chin and kept his gaze. “I got good praise today from my professor is all.”

            “The young one?” he asked, raising a brow and making to push himself up off the couch.

            “No, no. Mrs. Kellner.”

            Bert rose, put the soda down on the coffee table and stood in front of her. “Good. Now what you gonna fix me for dinner?” he asked, running the back of his hand down the side of her face, gently, slowly.

            “Whatever you want, Sugar,” Juniper replied, tugging the corner of her mouth up into the semblance of a smile. Her shoulders slumped and she headed for the kitchen.

 

            Juniper and Bert had come from Georgia almost a year earlier, Bert to work at the Paper Mill in Meadowvale and Juniper to attend school. Though most of the young people in their home town were of the same sort—poorly educated with few prospects—Bert was willing to move to find a better life and Juniper was bright enough to do the same. Her high school had the good fortune to employ a former military man as its science teacher. He had worked on some of the earliest computers and when he saw the spark of genius in little Juniper, he latched on to her and mentored her in mathematics and physics well enough that she was able to squeak into Backupsmore University—the only person in her class that year to attend a four-year college. At the same time, her parents were eager to see her settle down and start a family of her own. Ever the people-pleaser, as well as an analytical wunderkind, Juniper figured out a way to have it all. Or so she thought.

            She married Bert on the condition that she could pursue her education. Bert Hatfield was a strong-willed young man of twenty when they married the day before the couple moved to Ohio. He was a good, strong man with broad shoulders and red-brown hair. He put in long hours at the factory while she attended classes. He liked his meat well-done, his soda cold (never touched strong drink), and his wife attentive. Believing in the vows they had exchanged to be sacred, and holding Bert to his promise, Juniper played the dutiful wife and bent over backwards to please him. As long as she was allowed to study, she’d be alright.

 

**Glass Shard Beach - June, 1972**

            The twins graduated from Glass Shard High (Sandra Valedictorian-Summa Cum Laude, and Sandi by the skin of her teeth). While Sandra thought about how she could pack everything she wanted to bring with her to California in the most efficient and space-conserving way possible, Sandi Pines had been aggressively dating Carl McCorkle for four months. In June, he finally came over to meet the family. Sandra remembered him from school; he’d graduated a few years ahead of them. He was a meathead like most of the guys in town, but she couldn’t judge him on that quality alone. Her sister was a bit of a meathead herself and Sandra loved her dearly.

            Carl was tall, strong-jawed, and had a way of giving Sandi a half-lidded eyebrow-waggle that made her weak in the knees. Sandra was almost positive they had ‘done it’ already, but Sandi didn’t talk about Carl much around her. In fact, the twins didn’t see each other very much at all lately. It seemed that Carl always wanted to see ‘his girl’. Sandra shivered as he called her this again from across the dining room table and waggled his eyebrows at her. Sandi giggled. Mr. and Mrs. Pines were charmed. Carl’s father owned a chain of laundromats in three towns. Carl himself managed one of them. His clothes were new and fashionable and he had already bought Sandi a piece of jewelry: a small captured pendant necklace made up of a tiny pearl trapped in a low-karat golden cage. Their father was impressed.

            “So, you goin’ to tha dance Saturday, Sandra?” Carl asked. “I can hook you up wit dis guy I know.”

 _‘Nice way to assume I don’t have a date, you Neanderthal’_ , she thought. “Oh, I don’t know,” she said. “I might go stag.”

            “Whatever,” Carl said, suddenly disinterested and shoveled another meatball into his large mouth. He wasn’t unattractive, but everything about him made Sandra’s skin crawl. There was something not quite right in the way he looked past you when he spoke—the way he seemed to be only half-listening to what you said in reply. She struggled to remember what he was like in school as she pushed her food around her plate. _‘Betsy Baxter,’_ she thought suddenly. _‘And Alice Washington. Donna Marino, Peggy Johnson, Judy Schneider...’_ Sandra’s head snapped up and she glared at Carl with fiery eyes. _‘Oh no, Carl the Heartbreaker McCorkle is dating my sister!’_

 

            That Saturday afternoon—the day of the big dance—Sandra packed her crochet tote bag full of books to return at the library and headed out. Her sister and mother had started the throes of Getting Ready and Sandra really needed a break. Deep in thought about that evening’s festivities and wishing she could just blow it off for a quiet night at home with a good book or even just watch Archie Bunker with her father, she wandered straight past the pillared library building and continued to the park.

            Her dress for the dance was cute, and just plain enough that she’d be able to wear it to other events. Her sister had helped her pick it out months ago, before she started dating Carl. They went to the ‘boutique’ in their neighborhood and found a sweet little white slip-dress with embroidered yellow and blue flowers that was just perfect. Sandra scoffed a little at the thought that she could wear it to Sandi and Carl’s inevitable wedding. At the boutique, Sandi had found the shortest, tightest dress in the shop to be to her liking. It was day-glow orange and red with a paisley pattern. Sandi complained that she would have to wear her usual white boots because she had only enough money for the dress, but she could still cut a mean rug with them, so it was alright. Then, Sandra had looked forward to dancing with her sister, but now she wasn’t sure she had the courage to go and stand off to the side and watch Carl grope Sandi all night. What was she thinking? Carl was a jerk, she was sure of it, but Sandra hadn’t had the nerve or the time to confront her with her feelings, and now, she was sure, it was too late.

            Sandra had her head down, counting the cracks in the sidewalk as she entered the park, intent on sitting on a bench and trying to make up her mind about the dance when a familiar voice drew her attention to a spot not far from where she walked. There he was, Carl the Heartbreaker, with a redheaded young woman who was definitely not Sandi Pines. “Yeah, it’s a pretty sweet ride,” he bragged, lounging with his legs spread wide. “You should come cruisin’ wit me some time.”

            The girl giggled. “How ‘bout tonight, Carl?”

            “Nah, no good. I got plans,” he said. “How bout tomorrow?”

            She giggled again. “Sunday sounds groovy,” she cooed back.

            Sandra stopped and pivoted ninety degrees to face them. “You!” she shouted, making them both jump. She held out an accusatory finger. “You Neande— you _caveman_!!” she cried.

            The redhead blushed but smirked at her. “One a your girlfriends, Babe?” She put her hand on his chest and he relaxed back against the bench.

            “This freak? You kiddin’ me? I’m doin’ her sister.”

            Usually, the word freak would send Sandra Pines scurrying away. Usually, the thing she wanted least in the world was confrontation. Usually, people didn’t insult her twin sister. A vein throbbed on her forehead and she took a step forward. “Do… ‘doin’’? ‘DOIN’’, you _sack of excrement?!_ How many other girls are you currently ‘doin’’?!”

            “Sack a wha?” he sneered at her. “What’s it to you, nerd? Fraid I’m gonna hurt Sandi? She knows what she’s in this for,” he said, motioning to his crotch.

            Sandra’s face went crimson. “No she does _not!_ You came over for dinner! You…scumbag lowlife jerkoff snake…you…!” She was out of euphemisms to sling at him that would come anywhere close to how she felt about him without really cursing so she stomped her foot. “You stay away from her!” Sandra demanded.

            Carl laughed and turned back to nuzzling the redhead’s neck. “Ok. _Done_.”

            Feeling as though she would be physically ill, Sandra turned on her heel and stormed back to Pines Pawns.

            .x.

            Sandra climbed the stairs slowly and quietly. She could hear her mother and sister’s voices coming from the bathroom, hard at work on Sandi’s hair. She passed the doorway on the way to her room and glanced at the large bouffant nearing completion. “Sand! Where you been?!” Sandi called to her. “Get your dress on! Dad’s takin’ us over in fifteen minutes!”

            “What?” she asked, back-tracking and looking at her watch. It was much later than she had imagined. “Oh, uh…ok. I…sure.”

            “You’re not flakin’ on me, are ya?”

            “No, no. I…I’ll go get changed.” Sandra went and did as she was told. The dress was a thick, white linen, made heavier by the macramé and embroidered flowery details. She changed and had just sat down at the vanity to brush her hair when the phone rang.

            “Got it!” Her mother and sister’s voices called in unison and laughed. Like many modern families, the Pines had a phone mounted next to the toilet. “Hiya, Sweetie! You excited for tonight?” Sandi’s voice chirped. “You what?”

            Sandra’s heart sank and she dropped the hairbrush she was holding.

            “But…But…! But…What? _When?_ But! _No!_ Carl, no, wait, _please!_ I can…”

            Sandra stared at her own reflection in the vanity mirror as if watching a movie and when her twin stormed into the room, fully makeuped and coiffed, she didn’t bat an eye. She looked up at her reflection and saw the tears smudging Sandi’s mascara and the deep pout on her dark red lips. “What is wrong with you?!” she shouted. “Carl broke it off with me! He said you told him not to see me anymore!”

            Her blood unfroze and boiled in an instant. Of course he hadn’t told her the context of their conversation. “He’s a scumbag, Dee...” she said slowly.

            “Says _you!_ He was _connected,_ Sandra! He woulda looked after me!”

            Sandra gaped and leapt to her feet. “Are you kidding me? You don’t know what he was doing with that redhead I caught him with and everyone else from school…!”

            “ _I don’t care!_ ” Sandi screamed and Sandra caught her breath. “You think I don’t know? I don’t care about that. He was gonna _marry me_ , Sandra! I _need_ him—I need a _future!_ _You got yours!_ ”

            “You don’t need a man to have a future!”

            Her sister stomped her feet on the shag rug and her tears flew. “Yes I do!”

            Sandra clenched her fists. Usually, she would have reached out. Usually, she would have hugged her close. Usually she would have told her she had her back, but the idea of her being tethered to some jerk for the rest of her life defied all reason and was completely unacceptable to her. “Come with me!” she blurted out. “You can come with me to California and…”

            Sandi’s eyes grew wide. She shook her head and looked at her as if she’d just asked her to jump off a bridge. “Are you kiddin’ me?”

            Their mother’s red painted fingernails grasped the doorframe and she pulled herself into view, glaring at Sandra. “What have you done?” she snapped.

            “Mom, I can explain…”

            Mrs. Pines raised her hand and held up her index finger. “I heard the whole thing. Sandra, you are _so_ grounded.”

            “But…!”

            Her mother extended the finger to point at her. “No dance! _Grounded!”_

            “Dee!” Sandra pleaded with her twin. “Tell her…I only meant to…” But Sandi’s eyes dropped to her left hand. She touched her barren ring finger then looked away. Devastated, Sandra Pines hung her head as her sister ran from the room they shared, bawling her eyes out.

            Mrs. Pines cast a dirty look at her smarter, more upwardly-mobile daughter and closed the door behind her as she left. She followed Sandi to the bathroom and plucked three or four tissues from the box “I’m so sorry, Baby.”

            Sandi held her tearful face in her hands. “Ma, I’m gonna…I wanna…I need to dance. Is that ok?”

            “Sure Sandi, sure. Pops is still waitin’ for ya with the car.”

            “Who knows,” Sandi said, tugged her skirt down, adjusted her cleavage then sat down to fix her makeup. She gave her mother a half-smile. “Maybe I’ll meet someone.”

            .x.

            Sandra didn’t remember pulling the little white dress over her head and dumping it on the floor. She found herself in her underwear in front of the closet so she took a shift from the hanger, dropped it onto her skinny shoulders and crawled into bed. The coolness of the muslin sheets enveloped her and she curled into a ball and wept into her pillow.

            .x.

            Sandi Pines didn’t meet a new guy at the dance, but she did meet the older sister of a classmate and the two hit it off. They had both been dumped recently and had a lot in common. The older girl lived and worked in Atlantic City and invited Sandi to come stay with her. She did not mention this to her sister when she returned later than evening. She did not greet her in the morning when they woke, nor did she speak a single word to her unless absolutely necessary.

            .x.

            Three days passed. Sandra spent most of her time at the library or in the park, coming home for dinner and then only entering their bedroom if she needed to change or sleep. On the third day, she returned at around five in the evening to find a startling scene. Her sister Sandi was hugging their parents. She wore a coat and hat, and two blue matching hard-side suitcases stood nearby. “Well, I’m off!” Sandi chimed and turned around to face her sister. “Good luck, Sis.” She stuck out her hand.

            “Good…what?”

            “I got a job in Atlantic City! Good luck with school!” her voice was clear and confident but her eyes would not look directly at her twin. She stood there and awkwardly pushed her hand out farther, insisting she shake it.

            “Atl…you’re… _leaving?”_

Sandi’s lower lip quivered but it was only temporary. “If you ain’t gonna give me a proper good-bye, then that’s fine. _Good luck!”_ she shouted, grabbed her bags, and stomped loudly down the stairs. A blue Chevy was waiting for her. She threw her bags in the back, jumped in the passenger seat and slammed the door behind her. Sandra ran to the window and watched in disbelief as the car pulled away.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not one to tag stuff, but thought I should mention that there is some domestic violence in this chapter.

**Atlantic City, 1972**

            Before gambling was legalized in the State of New Jersey, bringing with it an influx of much needed revenue, Atlantic City was a dump. A long period of decline had seen most of the grand old hotels demolished and work was hard to come by, but not for a pretty young woman like Sandi Pines. The friend she was rooming with found her a job as a waitress at a restaurant in the neighborhood and she worked long hours in order to afford her share of the rent. The restaurant, “Le Canard En Feu” was only a block away from the apartment on North Carolina Avenue on the corner of Atlantic and Chalfonte. Despite its french name and menu, it was best known as a large, dark, watering hole. At all hours of the day could be found lonely, desperate people drinking their meals, hugging the bar. Sandi did her best to remain upbeat, at least on the outside, but after a few months the thought that she’d be serving drinks to the dejected unemployed for the rest of her days started to wear on her.

            One of her regular customers was a man called Dave who had a thing for her. He said he was a professional photographer. He said she was pretty. He could make her some money if she’d sit for him. Dave wasn’t too hard on the eyes and she figured, hell, why not.

            .x.

            “You’ve got such gorgeous eyes,” he said, peering through the lense and frequently over it. “Such long lashes. You look great in that blouse. They’re gonna love this.” Sandi wore a pink top with spaghetti straps. It had cute gathers and bows on the front that accentuated her fairly large breasts. “Turn a little more to the right, honey. Maybe if we…” he came out from behind the camera and made some adjustments. He ran a hand through her hair and dropped one of the straps off of her shoulder. “Yeah, try that. Looks good.”

            Sandi blushed and ate it up. “Ya want me to do this?” she asked and rolled her shoulders forward, increasing the depth of her cleavage.

            Dave froze for a moment. “Uh, yeah!” He chuckled to himself. “You _got it,_ honey. You’re damn gorgeous, you know that? Maybe, lean forward a little. That’s it. And…” he froze again as Sandi batted her eyes and gave the camera a sultry yet innocent look. “Oh yeah. That’s it, honey. You got this. You are _so_ good…”

            She tried hard not to grin. “You like that?” she asked.

            “Oh yeah…” Dave drawled. “Ya know, there’s a guy I know could use a girl like you for a _special_ shoot. You free tomorrow?”

            Sandi’s heart raced. She wasn’t smart, but most people didn’t know she was clever. Thanks to her ex-boyfriend Carl’s more depraved proclivities, she knew a thing or two about what men wanted and that if you gave them a little of it (just a little—too much and you were a slut) you got _‘honey’._ “Oh, I think so,” she replied. “Is it for a magazine?” she asked, putting a finger on her lower lip.

            “You bet,” he muttered, shooting away. “You’re gonna be perfect, honey. Just perfect.”

            At the bar, Sandi never saw young, pretty women looking dejected and desperate. She only ever saw them on the arms of men who were paying for their drinks. They wore new, pretty dresses, their hair was done up, and they laughed at the men’s jokes. She watched Dave press his crotch against the camera’s tripod and could see that she’d had an effect on him and it drove her wild. “Oh, good,” Sandi breathed, doing her best Marilyn Monroe impression. “I could use the _exposure_. Say, do you think I’d make a good blond?”

            “Oh yeah, honey. Blond. Great,” he said. “Tomorrow, yeah?”

            “Yeah, sure,” she agreed, smiling sweetly for the camera and dropped the other strap. She wouldn’t have to pay for the hair dye, or much else for that matter, for a long while.

 

**Meadowvale, Ohio - April 1975**

            The summer before, Juniper Hatfield gave birth to a baby girl they called Cindy. While Bert was concerned that Juniper wouldn’t be able to be a good mother and go to class, she was amazingly able to handle all aspects of her life with calm and grace—at least, on the outside. Bert grew more and more demanding, in the home and out, when it came to meals, or Cindy, or the bedroom, and soon Juniper felt her facade start to crack. Pleasing him was becoming harder and harder to do without giving up what she felt was her true purpose in life. But her parents were pleased, her daughter was well cared for, and for the most part her marriage was stable. Soon, she’d have more reason to keep up her end of the bargain.

 

            On a lovely spring day in April, she made Bert a great meal complete with cherries jubilee for dessert and after he had finished the last bite Juniper cleared his plate and passed him a folded piece of paper.

            “What’s this?” he asked, not touching it.

            “Great news,” she said softly and pushed it a little closer.

He hesitated and raised a brow before taking it and unfolding it. Bert squinted. “West Coast Tech?”

            “Yeah!”

            “You don’t go there.”

            “I will starting September, Sug. I got in!”

            He blinked at her. “You already got a school. You almost done widdit, remember?”

Juniper’s heart raced but she sat firm. “ _Undergraduate_ , yes. This is _grad_ school. I’m pursuing a doctorate. You remember. Well, I got in! We’re going to California!” she cheered, but her nerves were stretched taut and her voice came out at a reedy trill. “Remember our deal? I get to pursue an education…?”

            “You _done_ ,” Bert said, slapping the letter down on the table. “Come June you done with that, Juniper.”

            “No, you see…” Juniper flinched as he suddenly stood up. She suppressed a shiver as her plan came undone. She had thought that if she filled him with good food and kept him in a good mood all week that he would be able to accept the change. He would remember the deal they had made at the altar. But too much time had passed and he had become bitter and unyielding. And now, she had slipped up. Of all the things to say, ‘no’ was not a word she was allowed to use.

            He crossed to the ‘living room’ in a few steps and picked up the handgun he kept on top of the television. “I see. Oh, I see alright. I seen it comin’, inch by inch I give you ‘n now you take a mile.” He sat back down across from his wife and placed the gun in front of him on the table. “California? You lost your _mind_ , woman?!”

            “Please, Bert, the baby…” Juniper whispered staring hard at the grey metal before her. Cindy had been sleeping in her crib not far from where they ate in their tiny apartment, but began to fuss as she heard her father shout.

            Bert’s mouth screwed up into a frustrated pout and he took a deep breath. “Don’t you tell me what to do in my house!” he cried and reached for the gun.

            Time slowed. Juniper thought only of her baby daughter and reached out for her husband’s hands. They fumbled for control but he was too fast. He pulled the trigger and the shot nearly missed its mark, grazing her underarm close to the shoulder but missing her chest. The baby started to cry. Juniper fell backwards, taking the chair with her and scrambled to get up. “Cindy!” she screamed as Bert made for the crib.

            “Shut it!” he shouted and took aim at the red-faced infant lying inside. Juniper lunged at him and though she was not one hundred and ten pounds, she threw him off balance. He crashed against the doorframe leading to the bedroom, smacking his head on the woodwork, and went down in a heap.

            Juniper paused for only a moment to make sure he was out before grabbing Cindy and her purse and fleeing the apartment, screaming for help.

            .x.

            In a few months Bert Hatfield was convicted and sentenced to ten years for attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon. Through the trial Juniper continued to attend class, finding that learning and caring for her daughter were life-savers. Before moving to California that September, she visited the County Clerk’s office.

            “Are you sure this is what you want?” the clerk asked, raising a quizzical brow at the young woman.

            “A woman has to do what she has to do, sir. And he’s never gonna know to look for someone named ‘Fiddlefern McGucket’!”

            .x.

            Fiddlefern (the former Mrs. Hatfield) finished the program for advanced quantum physics and computer science at West Coast Tech in 1979, but struggled to find grant money to do what she was capable of. Ever the social butterfly, Fiddlefern met a woman at a party who said she knew a recent grad who had been given a large grant and was looking for an assistant in the middle of nowhere in the Pacific Northwest.

            “Things are lookin’ up, Tater-tot!” Fiddlefern beamed at her little daughter when she read the letter of greeting from Dr. Sandra Pines. “We’re movin’ to Oregon!”

 

 

**Silver Lake, Los Angeles, CA - March, 1977**

            Carolina Chalfonte sauntered from her brand new, gold-painted Pontiac Grand Prix (license plate “SNDIMBL”) a short distance to her apartment door. She wore six-inch red patent leather heels, a tiny black leather miniskirt and a red-and-gold low-cut cowlneck top and carried a big brown paper bag. She tossed her head back to get the large, bleach-blond bangs out of her face as she fumbled for her keys. The apartment was well-appointed and stylish, but it was clear that the kitchen was the most unused room in the house. The contents of the bag were removed: a bottle of vodka, cranberry juice, some TV dinners, and a bunch of bananas. She put the dinners in the freezer (which save for ice was empty) poured herself a vodka-cran and deposited herself on the couch. When about half of the large glass was empty, Carolina sighed and pulled the telephone on the end table to her left into her lap. “Ok, baby, let’s do this.” She cleared her throat and dialed a long-distance number.

            “Hi, Ma. Yeah, it’s me, who else would it be? Oh _right_ , like that’s gonna happen. What? I’m being honest. No. _No!_ Of course not, she can keep her nose shoved right up her…I’m sorry. No you’re right, it’s just hard bein’ the bigger person when she won’t even visit for Christmas for Christ’s sakes. Sorry. I will. Ten Hail Marys, sure Ma. How’s Pop? Uhuh. Not much. Got a new commercial I’m in. No, just the local channels here in LA. I know. I can’t afford a betamax, Ma and you ain’t got a player, anyways. Besides, you wouldn’t wanna see ‘em. Because they’re stupid, that’s why. Ok. No, I’m with Glenn now. Mike was a jerk, that’s why. No, that was Fred. That was last year. I dunno if there is such a thing as Mr. Right, Ma, they’re all bastards. Sorry. Another ten, I got it. I will. I can’t promise that, but I’ll try to get to church, ok? I _go_ at Christmas! So everything good? Good. Well, I just wanted to check in. Sure thing, Ma. Love you too. Buh-bye.” She hung up and slumped back against the plush couch and remained motionless for a moment. Before she could reach for the vodka-cran again, the phone rang. She cleared her throat. “Hello? Oh hey, Steve. Nothin’. What? Tonight?” She looked at the clock. It was nearly eight. “I guess. But, I dunno if Glenn would like that, much. Yeah, kinda. You need a girl for that shoot? The plot sounds fun. Ha ha. Yes, _plot_. Well, if you think I’d be perfect, then I guess we can hang out tonight. Sure. See you then, Steve.” Carolina hung up. “Fuck,” she whispered. “Poor Glenn. He was nice, too.”

 

.x.

            Breaking it off with Glenn went just about as smoothly as it had for Mike, or Fred, or any number of other guys Carolina had been with in the last five years. After the first two or three, she learned not to bother getting attached. They were all after the same thing and if she wasn’t the careful manipulator, she got manipulated. Her lifestyle may have been unsavory, but she made damn certain she got what she wanted out of each encounter. Although her life had fallen into a fairly boring pattern of late, the steady influx of cash and attention served her needs just perfectly. Who cared if she didn’t find Mr. Right like her mother back in Jersey wanted? She could play Mr. Wrong over and over again for at least another ten years. By then, she’d have enough saved to not have to worry so much and maybe then she’d look for one guy to hold on to. Not now. There was no way she could manage that now.

            Her gold Pontiac purred into the parking lot of a nearly vacant motel one sunny afternoon a few days after she went on a date with Steve. She got out wearing large, glamorous sunglasses and a long, low-cut bright blue summer dress. The note in her hand said ‘Room 219, 1 PM’.

            The door was propped open and inside was a hive of activity. Five people, four men and a woman did not immediately acknowledge her as she entered. On one end of the room tall stands with lights pointed toward the bed and the front door. One man wore a jumpsuit with the name ‘Daryl’ embroidered on the right breast and he chatted with another man tending the lights and another standing by a large film camera. The blond woman was getting her makeup done in the bathroom and had her back to Carolina. Steve turned and greeted her. “Care! Oh, you look great. That dress is perfect. Hey, Josie? This is Care—Carolina Chalfonte. Big star. You should be impressed.” He winked as the woman got up and joined them.

            “Hi. Josie,” the woman said, shyly.

            Steve wiggled his eyebrows at her. “Isn’t she perfect?”

            Carolina blinked at the woman. Her blond hair was tied up in a bun and she wore oversized glasses and an unflattering pantsuit, but the striking thing about her was her face.

            “Y-you replacin’ me?” Carolina asked, stammering. “She looks just like me!”

            Steve made a confused face for a moment then brightened. “Oh! That’s right. We changed the script yesterday. When I saw Josie here I just knew we had to do this! New twist. You and Daryl are gonna be goin’ at it, right? And instead of the cleaning lady bargin’ in on you and makin’ the threesome, it’s your _twin sister!_ Sexy, right?”

            Carolina took a step backward and all the blood drained from her face.

            “Care?”

            Her response was firm, clear and shocking. “No.”  
            “What?”  
            Josie looked genuinely hurt. Carolina thought it must have been her first shoot, poor kid. Oh well, she wasn’t going to let this waif’s feelings change her mind about this. “No, Steve. No. I can’t.”

            His features darkened. “You _what?_ ”

            The other three men stopped chatting and stared.

            Carolina looked from Steve’s uncaring face, to the puppy-dog eyes on the kid Josie, to the perplexed cameraman and lighting guy, to ‘Daryl’ whose name she forgot but had ‘starred’ with a few times before, and just shook her head. They didn’t want or need her excuses. There was nothing else to say. That was it. She grabbed her purse and fled the motel.

 

.x.

            “Care, you were just here!” the receptionist at the hairdresser’s declared as she saw her enter.

            “Yeah, I gotta change it up. Can you fit me in?”

            Her usual gal, Jessica, had an opening shortly, so Carolina didn’t have long to wait. By the time she was shampooed, she was ready.

            “Whaddaya need, hun? We just did this!” Jessica, a woman in her mid thirties, round and with rosy cheeks and jet black hair plucked at her damp feathered blond bangs. “You don’t like my work?” she teased.

            “I got a new role. I gotta play a real dormouse, type. Need it brown. _Plain old brown_.”

            “We say _brunette_!” Jessica pretended to chastise her and draped a smock over her.

            “Ok.”

            “So what’s the role?” she asked as she got her equipment ready.

            “Well,” Carolina averted her eyes from her own reflection. “It’s sort of a tragedy, I guess. Sad sack of a gal. Never found love, moved far from home, didn’t know nobody. But she had a sister who didn’t live that far away. See, five-six years ago they had a fight. Well, she got mad at somethin’ her sister done, and they ain’t talked since.”

            “Is she from Jersey? You have got that accent down perfectly!”

            Carolina, the perfect actress, laughed. “Yeah! I sure do!”

            Jessica started to apply the dye. “So, is this girl going to tell her sister that she’s sorry and make up?”

“If her sister would get her head out of her ass, maybe!” She took a deep breath. “But she’s an _intellectual_ ,” she said, drawing out the word to pronounce each syllable. “Cares more about writin’ papers and crap than she does about what happened to her poor sister, even though her sister did everything she could to make sure that she wouldn’t worry about her! See, they were so tight when they were younger that they didn’t spend a moment apart. And the sister had a deformity, see. A weird thing where she…she has six fingers on both her hands, the sister does. And she was so smart people always teased her and so her sister always stood up for her. And the one I’m playing, the ‘normal’ one, she wasn’t that bright. Like, barely passed school. _Barely._ ” She chuckled lightly. “So her sister helped her and stood up for her against people who thought she was dumb. Turns out she was so dumb that she didn’t know what to do about her sister goin’ away to college, far, _far_ away. So she tried to get married real fast so that she’d be secure and the sister wouldn’t have to worry. She didn’t care if he was maybe not great, as long as Sandra didn’t have to worry and could study and get what she wanted. It didn’t matter. But Sandra screwed it up. She wrecked my plans…”

            Jessica paused her work and looked at Sandi’s reflection in the mirror. “You ok, hun?”

            Her eyes brimmed over. “And they haven’t spoken since,” she whispered.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> At last! my lovely gender-swapped Fidd!Author emerges from the inky depths!! I love these poor lady scientists... Enjoy the comfort... hurt's a-coming'...

**Vegas - March, 1977**

            When Sandi Pines arrived in Vegas, she was astounded by the glitz and lights of the strip, as well as the mundane banality of everything else outside of it. Within a few hours of arriving she got a job waiting tables and only had to live out of her car for a few days before finding a furnished apartment. She moved her few possessions in and sat on the rather scary-looking red couch. Less than a week earlier she had left the ‘set’, got her hair dyed, went home, packed a bag and a few treasured items, and abandoned all else of her life in Los Angeles. As far as she was concerned, Carolina Chalfonte was dead. Sandi flipped through the classifieds once she’d unpacked and started circling. Dancer, Bartender, Showgirl, Table Girl…the list was not long but very intriguing to the young woman who had spent much of the last six years in what could justifiably be called the ‘entertainment industry’.

            She was a good dancer, but the easy lifestyle of an adult film star had been unkind to her physique. Just by looking at the other girls auditioning for a dance revue at one of the casinos, Sandi knew she’d have to get in serious shape to get any kind of work worth having in this town. For the next few months, she made it happen and when she auditioned again, she got a gig at the illustrious Stardust.

            The girls were nice girls—no drugs, no kink. Sandi grinned wide with the thought that she’d finally gotten a nice clean job as she got ready to leave rehearsal. “Ok, gals, for this production we need blonds so if you don’t got it, dye it by next week!” the director announced as he released them for the day. Sandi kept her smile up, but her stomach flipped at the thought. No way was she going back there again…

            She showed up the next week with a very convincing wig in the same style and color as the other girls. She had spared no expense and obtained a really pro-styled wig that set her back thirty dollars—almost a day’s pay! It was just for the gig, she thought. It went on with her costume (which was fairly revealing, but a hell of a lot better than being naked for work) and she didn’t have to look at her own reflection for that long after it did, so it was ok. Rehearsal was good, it didn’t slip at all and no one seemed to notice. As she waved goodbye to a couple gals she’d gotten to know and started to head to the parking lot, the director called her over to his seat in the theater. By the time she wound her way off the stage and to his seat, everyone else had left.

            “Good job today,” he said. He was leaning back with his feet propped up on the back of the seat in front of him. “But, I’m gonna hafta let you go.”

            Sandi’s heart flipped. “What? Is it about the wig? I-I can dye it if you want, I just…”

            “No, no. Ya see, this is a fine upstanding institution, ya know,” he said, raising a brow and not hiding a smarmy smirk. “We can’t have your sort of woman tarting the place up, can we, _Carolina?”_

            Sandi froze, mouth agape, and stared at the director. Her shoulders slumped and she lowered her eyes. “I suppose not.”

            “Unless…” he said quickly. “You _blow_ me right here, right now.”

            For a second, Sandi thought that wasn’t such an unusual request, but a second later she frowned in disgust at herself for still being programmed to do what men wanted her to do and at this scumbag sitting before her. “Go fuck yourself,” she hissed, turned and stormed off. “You can’t fire me, I quit!” She thanked whatever patron saint there might have been for tarts like her that she didn’t start crying until her back was turned and she was well on her way out of the theater.

 

.x.

            A few days later, Sandi circled another set of classifieds and got back on the horse. This time, she was accepted as a showgirl at the Tropicana. She wore a headdress, a leotard covered in sequins, and tall, high-heeled shoes. In costume, Sandi looked just like all the other girls in the revue. At rehearsal one day, she was chatting with some of the spunkier of the gals and one of them told a great story about some guy she was dating and it was so funny that they all laughed. Sandi’s laugh was loud and distinctive and much appreciated by the joke-teller. As they were about to get back to work, Sandi heard a word from across the stage that drew her attention so fast she pulled a muscle in her neck. “…ina Chalfonte!” she heard a man say. Off in the wings, the lighting guy was chatting with one of the techs. “I’m tellin’ you, man. That’s her, only brunette. You heard that laugh, right? Man, that one where she takes the two guys in the parking garage and the watchman gives it to her with the nightstick? That’s some good shit right there. I bet she’s a total whore in real life. You gotta be if you get fucked for a living, right?” The tech elbowed him and nodded toward Sandi to show the lighting guy that she was staring at him. He just laughed, nodded, and grabbed his crotch.

 

.x.

            “Third time’s the charm, right?” Sandi slurred a little, halfway into her second B&B. She circled a posting in the classifieds that read ‘Wanted: Nice-looking, open-minded girl assistant for magic show. Must have great legs. Work involves big cats’. “That’s me!” she beamed and sipped the brandy demurely. “I got some god damn great legs right here an’ I’mma nice lookin’ young broad, and I love kitties! ‘S’long as they don’t wanna cut me in ha-half!” She hiccupped and giggled.

 

            Richard & King were an up-and-coming magic act and their schtick involved your average magic show, sword box, escape, cards, you name it—but with one unusual addition.

            “Yah, vee have Ligers,” King (whose real name was König), said as Sandi gaped at the cage of three white half-lion/half-tigers.

            “Zey are zo rare, you see, peepil _luff_ zem,” agreed Richard (who’s real name was Riechart). “Und vee need a brafe young fraulein who is not afraid of zem.”

            Sandi couldn’t stop staring at them. She hadn’t realized that ‘big cats’ meant ‘carnivores’. “This what you meant by open-minded? You ain’t gonna feed me to em or nothin’ are ya?”

            King laughed. Richard frowned. “Of course not. You need to be open minded because vee are…”

            King cut him off. “Vee are _partners_ ~” he said, lowered his chin and raised a brow at her.

            Sandi sighed with relief. “You’re queers, yeah, I get it. So just to be clear here, I’m not gonna get eaten by a liger?”

            King laughed again. “Ach, you are _so_ hired! I like her, Rick!”

            “I got just one thing I gotta tell you two,” Sandi said and shifted her weight. The ligers had calmed and were lounging on each other lazily. Sandi approached the cage and crouched down to scratch the top of one of their heads. It purred loudly. “I been either fired or chased off the last two jobs I tried to get because I got outted for doin’ porn. So if you got a problem with that, just say so now so I can just go home and not have to go through that all over again.”

            “Porn? Vat? _Straight_ porn?” King scoffed. “Honey, vee don’t know a sing about it and if ze audience should recognize you, do you sink zey vill turn to zeir vife und kids and say, oh, zat’s a girl I’ve sich abzapfen aus? I don’t sink zo.”

            Sandi’s eyes glistened with hope but she waited for the sullen Richard to agree. It took some convincing, but fortunately her training as a dancer and her years in entertainment gave her not only great legs, but the presence and confidence needed to be on stage with two gay magicians wielding knives, flames, doves, and ligers. When he consented she hugged them both and promised to be the best assistant they’d ever had. And she was, for the five years she managed to stay in their employ.

 

**Gravity Falls, Oregon - September, 1980**

            The first conductor pad for the inter-dimensional gateway was complete. Fiddlefern raised her hand and shouted “Alright! Hi f-, eh, _high six!”_ Sandra grinned to split her face and slapped it with a resounding clap. They ascended in the elevator to take an early lunch to celebrate.

“We’ve got some ham and cheese and a little of the olive loaf stuff you like, bleh, and,” Sandra rummaged in the cupboards. “And yes, one bag of chips.” She shook the snack-size bag. “We can share.” They made sandwiches and sat down at the neat little kitchen table to eat.

            “I guess I used up the chips on Tatom’s lunches. I’m sorry, I’ll get us some more today.”

            Sandra waved her hand in between bites. “No problem. I don’t need the chips anyway,” she said, patting her belly. She thought about the little girl sitting down to eat her little lunch and gingerly picking out the chips from the bag one by one and it made her smile. “I have to tell you, Fiddsy, I love having you and Tatom here. I really didn’t know how lonely I was until you came along. I…I consider you family,” she said hesitantly.

            Fiddlefern blushed. “Why, we feel just the same, Sandra. We feel right at home here, for sure. We were alone, the two of us, after the divorce,” she said and looked down at her half-eaten sandwich. “We, uh, had, irreconcilable differences. He thought I could put up with him, and I didn’t,” she shot her a grin, but her eyes brewed with bad memories. “Say, I haven’t heard you mention your family, you got any kin back east?”

            It was a normal question, Sandra knew that. There was nothing prying about asking about someone’s relations. The normal way to respond would have been to just answer the question, so she attempted to do just that. “My older brother Sherman was killed in Vietnam, my dad is a pawn shop broker, my mother is a telephone psychic, and my sister is…” She gave it her best attempt, but failed. “She’s…”

            “Oh, Sandra, I didn’t mean to…”

            “It’s ok!” she said, a little too loudly as a few tears escaped. “We had a falling out and I haven’t spoken to her in…” she raised a hand as if to count on her fingers but shook her head, doing the math instead. “Nine years.” The reality of a decade passing slammed into her chest like a steering wheel in a car crash and she gasped for air. Sandra put her face in her hands and wept, shaking, desperate to stop but completely unable to do so.

            Fiddlefern leapt up, knocking her chair over, knelt at Sandra’s side and put one hand on her shoulder and one on her knee. “Oh no, I am so sorry, I am _so_ sorry, please! I didn’t mean to…!”

            Sandra looked down into the blond woman’s green eyes and was shocked to find them also full of tears. She appeared devastated and searching her face for some sign of forgiveness. Her posture, usually so confident and easygoing, was at that moment demure and soothing, almost desperate. “I miss my sister!” Sandra cried and bowed her head to rest on top of the other woman’s. Fiddlefern pulled her into an embrace and held her, shushing her softly, but letting her cry for what was probably a solid two minutes. When the torrent had slowed a bit, Sandra pulled back, removed her glasses and cleaned them on her shirt and blew her nose with her napkin. They chuckled briefly as both women performed the same action. “Thank you,” Sandra said and offered her friend a wan smile.

            She was understandably surprised. “Fer what? Makin’ you _cry_?”

            “I needed that. I have never told anyone about her before, let alone cried out loud—into my pillow silently, oh certainly—but aloud, never.” Sandra half-joked.

            The blond looked on her sympathetically. “You were close?”

            “Twins,” Sandra replied and her face twisted again. “Inseparable for eighteen years of our lives. Total strangers today. All because I got her lousy excuse for a boyfriend to dump her. I’ve had nine years to mull it over and I’m sure that she was trying to protect herself, to get married so that when I went to West Coast, she’d have someone to look after her. She thought she was dumb compared to me, but she wasn’t! She was _clever!_ She was quick-witted and funny and charming and that can get you a hell of a lot farther than being a bookish nerd who can’t even make conversation with strangers in the checkout line at the damned grocery store! And now I’m crying again!” she wailed and dropped her head onto her folded arms. The silverware clinked against the plates as the table bounced with the action. “And I miss her so much, every day. Every _single_ day.”

            Fiddlefern leaned in and wrapped her left arm over her head and stroked her hair and she calmed once more. After a while, Sandra sat up, cleaned her glasses again and took a deep breath. “So, how about you?” she asked, half-joking again. “Any reason you felt the need to apologize as if I’d threatened to do something terrible?”

            Fiddleford pursed her lips and nodded. “You know, for someone who professes to be socially inept, you are mighty perceptive, Miss Sandra.”

            “I don’t mean to pry, I just…”

            Fiddlefern shook her head. “You do not pry. We are friends and friends share. My stars, you’ve shared a whole heap with me, the least I can do is oblige.” She sat up straight and smoothed her hands over her skirt. “My ex-husband is currently serving eight-to-ten for nearly taking my life and the life of our child. Bless her heart, she was too young to remember, but it did leave her a bit _quiet_. I’ll never, ever forgive him for that. He was a monster, a right monster and I was a fool for fallin’ for him, but that’s what we do, isn’t it? We’re expected to find a mate or we’re just not right, are we?” Her voice was saw-toothed, bordering tears, but Sandra had a feeling that she’d cried enough over this particular chapter of her life already. “So, even when he gets out, he won’t find us. McGucket ain’t his name, nor is it mine. I made it up,” she said with a wink.

            A burst of laughter escaped Sandra’s lips. “And Fiddlefern?”

            “Oh heavens yes. It sounds a little like my old name, but I threw that one away,” she said, waving her hand. “You ok?”

            Sandra nodded. “You?”

            She nodded back. “Sandra, I only asked about your family because, well, I care about you, very much, and I didn’t want to upset you, I just wanted to know more about you,” Fiddlefern said softly and took a quiet breath. “I have to admit that I have a great _fondness_ for you.”

            The way she raised her brows, they way her lips moved around the word ‘fondness’ made Sandra straighten up in her seat. Fiddlefern closed her eyes as Sandra got up from the table, anticipating the worst reaction to her admission, but opened them in wonder as she opened the refrigerator door, took out two Miller High Lifes, twisted the caps off and placed them on the table. She sat down in her chair, took a long pull from one of the long necks and smiled on her friend. “I am weird in many ways,” Sandra said, enjoying the beer’s comfortable, cool, bitter taste as it went down. “When I was in college, I went to a therapist who gave me a good amount of reading material, but I still struggled to find a label. I decided none of them were for me.”

            “Therapists?”

            “Labels. The closest I came to anything that sounded right was ‘a-sexual’. I’d never felt anything _in that way_ toward anyone, not even fantasized about movie stars. I cared about my family, sure, well, my sister anyway, and I had some friends, not many, but never, _like that._ ”

            Fiddlefern’s brows arched. “I see.”

            “But, desire aside, I am also very fond of you, Fiddlefern, and I really think that I liked being hugged by you just now. And I know that I love having you and Tatom in my life.” Sandra lowered her chin. “Maybe…” her cheeks grew warm. “Maybe, if you can have patience with me?”

            The slight blond woman’s chest heaved and her posture shifted from hunched over her beer to practically peacock. “Oh, my, yes!”

 

.x.

            About a week later, Sandra and Fiddlefern had their lunch break outside on the porch. They wouldn’t have to meet Tatom at the school bus at the end of Gopher Road (about a mile from the house) until three o’clock, so they took their lunch at eleven in order to get another shift of work in before then.

            On the porch, in addition to a wicker couch, Sandra had pulled a small table from the house on which to rest drinks and sandwich plates. On this warm, September morning they sat for a while after they had finished eating and admired the breeze blowing through the pine trees that surrounded the remote property. It was not out of the ordinary for the women to enjoy each other’s company in silence and they hadn’t spoken a word in several minutes when Sandra jumped slightly and turned her eyes to her assistant who had placed her hand over hers and blushed slightly at her reaction. “Is this ok?” Fiddlefern asked. “I know you asked me to have patience with you, but I’d really rather like to hold your hand right now, if that’s alright?”

            Sandra lowered her eyes bashfully. “I-I don’t see why not.” When Fiddlefern gathered her fingers into hers, she stared at them. “They don’t… _disturb_ you?”

            “Your hands? Why, heavens, no. In fact, ever since I noticed them I’ve wanted to know what they felt like,” Fiddlefern said, batting her eyelashes.

            “R _-really_?”

            “Oh yes.” She gave them a squeeze and Sandra let out a husky giggle. She let Fiddlefern weave her slim five fingers between her six and sighed in relief.

            “I, uh…I feel pretty foolish,” Sandra whispered and fussed with the hem of her skirt with her free hand.

            “Whatever for?”

            She cleared her throat lightly and turned a little to face the blond on her left. “I’ve never held hands with anyone before.”

            Fiddlefern blinked rapidly at her. “You haven’t?” She shook her head. “I mean, I know you said that you felt as though you were a-sexual, but, well, that is just unbelievable to me! You are so precious, Sandra Pines!”

            “I have six fingers on each hand, Fiddlefern,” Sandra pointed out, lifting the one that still held her assistant’s. “No one has _ever_ wanted to hold them.”

            Fiddlefern’s eyes flashed with a hint of pity or distress. She caught her hand up in her left hand as well, brought it to her lips and gave the top of the middle knuckle a light kiss. When she saw her friend’s shoulders tense up she lowered the hand again. “Too much?”

            “Ah…I-I’m not sure, I…”

            “You poor dove, you’re not used to _any_ of this, are you?”

            “If by ‘this’ you mean everything.”

            Fiddlefern lowered her eyelids and her chin. “I mean _affection.”_

            She pouted. “No. I’m not. I just…” Sandra let out an exasperated sigh. “I’ve never… It’s all so foreign. It’s not that it doesn’t feel right or wrong, or scary, I just don’t know how to feel!”

            Her assistant hummed. “I think I know how you feel. We’re the same, you and I: we _thirst_ for knowledge and when we come _up against something_ we want to know about, we want to _learn_ ,” she drawled. “Am I right?” The way she leaned in slightly, ran her thumb over the back of Sandra’s fingers, and lowered her voice until it was pillow-soft made Sandra’s face burn and her throat constrict. All she could manage was a small nod. “And we get impatient when we have the book with all the answers right in front of us. We want to read it, study it, take it all in, and finally, _know_ it.”

            Sandra’s eyes travelled from her hand to Fiddlefern’s, up her arm, across her shoulders, down her neck, around her breasts, to her waist, and an unexpected shiver ran down her spine. “Holy Moses,” Sandra croaked.

            Fiddlefern raised an eyebrow at her and smirked. “Still think you’re a-sexual?”

            “How are you doing that?”

            “Doing what? Gettin’ you all hot and bothered? Well, I didn’t do a thing but hold your hand.” She wasn’t leaning in any closer, but rather Sandra had in the last moments leaned in toward her until she could feel the blond’s breath on her cheek, smell the sweetness of the Pitt Cola she’d been drinking, and the musky perfume she wore. “Sandra, can I kiss you?” she whispered. The nod was almost imperceptible. Fiddlefern cocked her head to the side slightly and placed a soft, simple kiss on her lips that lasted not more than two seconds. Sandra did not close her widened eyes, not wanting to miss a thing, but she saw that Fiddlefern had, and when her eyes shut something like a pulse of electricity ran from her lips to her hips. 

            “Was that alright?” Fiddlefern drawled. Another tiny nod. Fiddlefern slowly raised her left arm and placed her palm on Sandra’s cheek. “Can I kiss you some more? Just…a little more?”

            Sandra swallowed and found her mouth was incredibly dry. This woman was ‘fond’ of her, alright. And for the first time since she’d admitted it, she was showing her just how fond.

            For a decade, Sandra Pines had turned herself off. Her mother had never shown her much affection, saving it all for her son and her other daughter—the one who was much more like she was, outgoing and vivacious. Her father had been distant at best, verbally abusive at worst. Her brother was a ghost, even in life, a strong jaw line hovering somewhere above the little girls then frozen forever in a black and white photograph of a young man in uniform. Her sister—her best friend and confidant for eighteen years—was a stranger. She had no one. She needed no one. She _wanted_ no one. But right then, as the blond southerner with the green eyes pulled her close and lifted her chin expectantly, the walls came crumbling down.

            “Yes, please,” Sandra whispered.

            She could feel Fiddlefern’s smile under her own lips as she closed her eyes and focused on the electricity flowing in her veins, the texture of her hair, thicker than hers and a little wavy as Sandra wove her fingers through it. She followed the older woman’s lead, pressing into the kiss. A small moan escaped, startling her, but Fiddlefern only giggled appreciatively and put her right hand on Sandra’s thigh, whispering for permission, granted by a nod. Her hand rubbed over her skirt slowly, gently, fingers tracing along, reaching for the inner thigh and suddenly Sandra gasped and pulled away.

            “I’m sorry!” Fiddlefern cried, pushing back to put some distance between them. “That was too fast for you, I know, I just…”

            “No. No. It’s not. I mean, _it is_ , I let you, but it is. Too fast. I’m slow, I guess.” Sandra laughed lightly and shook her head at the ridiculousness of her words.

            “Oh my stars you are so cute,” Fiddlefern whispered, pulled her legs up underneath herself and closed the distance again. She sat on her bare feet and smiled on her. “I will have all the patience in the world with you, my Sandra. Just you wait.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh, and it should be obvious what inspired Richard and King, but does anyone (perhaps from Massachusettes?) get the ref of their names??


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can I tell you how fun it is to write dialog for that evil damn dorito? It's super fun. ESPECIALLY CAUSE HE SPEAKS IN CAPSLOCK.

**Gravity Falls, Oregon, December, 1980**

            The two lady scientists stepped out of the A-frame house they shared and breathed in the crisp, cold air. “Snow!” Fiddlefern cheered and moved a few steps to the left. Her small daughter Tatom, peered out, squinting at the freshly fallen white stuff, and gasped. “What’re ya waitin’ on, Tater-tot? Go git ya some!” The girl looked up at them both for a little more encouragement then rushed forward, waddling slightly in her snowsuit, and plunged into the fluffy powder. Some small flakes still fell but the sky was lightening as the storm passed. When Tatom had run out into the yard a fair distance Fiddlefern and Sandra sat down on the lip of the porch. Fiddlefern reached for her partner’s hand and gave it a squeeze.

            “Are you sure?” Sandra asked quietly.

            “I think it’s a perfect time, what with Christmas comin’.”

            Tatom heard the word Christmas and spun around. “Is it Christmas?” she asked, brightly.

            “Not yet, Tatom, honey. Soon, though!” She beamed a wide, disarming smile at her daughter whose eyes fell from her mother’s to the mittens clutched tightly together between her and her boss. “I bet you want to know why Miss Sandra and I are holdin’ hands,” she said quietly. Tatom nodded and slogged a few steps through the foot-high snow toward them. “Come on over here, Tater-tot.” She extended both her hands to her daughter and beckoned her close. Tatom approached and took her mother’s right hand in her left and gave Sandra a sidelong, uncertain glance. “Do you like holding my hand?” The girl nodded. “It’s because you love me, right?” Another nod. “I love you _and_ Miss Sandra,” she said.

            Sandra took a deep breath and steadied her nerves. “And I love you, too, Tatom. You are a ray of sunshine. Whenever I see you, I think of how warm you make me feel and I’m so glad you’re here.” The girl blushed and gave her a pleased looked through her overlong bangs. Sandra opened her hands and extended them to her and with only a little hesitation she grasped her left hand with her left and Fiddlefern pulled all three of them into a hug.

            “Oooh! I’m fit to _burst_ with love!” she squealed and rapidly rubbed her forehead against the top of the knitted hat her daughter wore. The two women held each other’s free hand between them. It was a brief hug, but when Tatom pulled away, her smile was permanent.

            “Do I have two mommies now?” she asked.

            Sandra Pines thought she felt her heart jump straight out of her chest. Her partner stumbled over her words trying to come up with something appropriate to say in reply but her own mouth moved of its own volition, perhaps empowered by the heart that was trying to launch itself out of her throat. “Yes. Yes, you do.”

            Tatom giggled, tickled pink by the idea and ran back to snow covered yard to continue playing.

“Sandra…” Fiddlefern whispered. “Are you sure you wanna be called ‘mommy’?”

            “Yes.” she answered and looked out at the quiet beauty surrounding them and the joyful child trying to catch snowflakes on her tongue.

            “But…”

            “ _Yes_ ,” Sandra asserted and spoke practically all in one breath. “I know we didn’t really discuss it, and you’ll be leaving once the project is over, but how far are you going, California? That’s not far. You can visit…”

            “We are not going _anywhere_.”

            “…and I do not want you to leave. _Please_ stay. I need you both so much and…wait, you _aren’t_?” Sandra looked over and saw that Fiddlefern had tears in her eyes. She squeezed her hand tightly.

            “We are staying right here if you want us. I want _you_. I _need_ you. I love you _so much_ , Sandra Pines.” Fiddlefern pulled her close and kissed her. Sandra moaned softly in relief. Only Tatom’s voice oohing at the sight snapped them apart. “My stars, Sandra. That was one doozy of a kiss.”

            She lowered her head and blushed crimson. “Wanted to make sure you knew I meant it.”

            Fiddlefern’s eyes lit up and she laughed. “Sakes girl, my _momma_ knows you meant it.”

            They laughed together.

            “You are so cute I cannot _stand_ it,” she drawled. “I feel like a groom on his wedding day must feel.”

            Sandra raised a brow and smirked. “You want to get married?”

            Fiddlefern scoffed. “Ain’t no State or God in Heaven gonna give us _that_ privilege.”

            “Doesn’t mean we can’t celebrate,” Sandra said seductively.

            “Oh my stars, now I feel like the _bride_!” Fiddlefern fanned herself with her mittened hand and Sandra laughed. “Course we can’t have a _proper_ wedding, license or no. Who would _come?_ My kin wouldn’t be able to fit all the crosses and kerosene they’d want to bring with ‘em on the plane, that’s for _dang_ sure.”

            Sandra nodded. “My dad would ignore my very existence and my mom’s Catholic, so she’d never stop trying to convince me that I was going to hell. And…” Her eyes dulled a little and, though she tried to keep it tacked in place, her smile slipped enough to be noticeable.

            “Oh, I am so sorry, I didn’t mean to…”

            Sandra put her mitten to Fiddlefern’s lips. “No. It’s ok,” She asserted. She removed it and took a deep breath. “I have no idea what Sandi would think. No idea at all.” She laced her arms around her middle and hugged the blond woman tightly, who then kissed the top of her head and whispered sweet apologies to her.

 

**Gravity Falls, Oregon - August, 1981**

            The big day was here. After more than a year of hard work, salvaging parts from an alien space craft, doing impossible calculations, and obtaining some less-than-legal fuel, the transuniversal polydimensional metavortex was fully operational. All that remained was to test it.

            Sandra and Fiddlefern prepared the test-dummy. They checked and double-checked the readings, tethered the dummy, reminded each other about the danger-zone past which the disruption of gravity would be too dangerous for them to cross. But they were giddy with the excitement of the project coming to its fruition and though they calmed down once the final lever had been thrown, their adrenaline still ran high enough for a large margin of error to occur.

            So when Fiddlefern’s body lifted off the ground and began floating quickly toward the vortex, Sandra was not prepared. She clamored for the rope and nearly didn’t catch it in time. She watched in fascinated horror as her partner was dipped into the black glow of the portal aperture. The opposite force was strong and Sandra wasn’t able to retrieve her until she got the rope looped around herself and could put her whole weight into the pulling.

            Meanwhile, the duration in which Fiddlefern McGucket was partially immersed in the portal seemed to stretch much longer for her than the actual fifteen seconds it took Sandra to pull her out. She gazed upon a scene unlike any she or anyone else from her world had ever laid eyes on before. In a black void like outer space, if outer space were simultaneously on fire and pulsing with psychedelic multi-color oil-transparency projections, four beings were playing poker: a hand—severed at the wrist, a giant eyeball with wings, a severed head with the face ripped off exposing the muscle and sinew beneath, and a yellow triangle wearing a top hat.

            “OH, HEY, JUNIPER. NICE OF YOU TO POP BY,” said the triangle. “LET’S SEE… WHERE ARE YOU AGAIN?” He snapped his fingers and a circle appeared around him with ten symbols on it. “OH THAT’S RIGHT. GLASSES. THAT’S A LAME NICKNAME IF I EVER HEARD ONE.” With another snap the image dispersed. “SO LISTEN, JUNIE, I THINK I’VE BEEN PRETTY PATIENT WITH THAT SANDRA PINES. PLAYTIME’S OVER. NOW THAT WE GOT THIS PUPPY WORKING, TELL YA WHAT? I’M GONNA GIVE YOU A LITTLE PRESENT.” His single eye wiggled suggestively. “DON’T EVER SAY I NEVER GAVE YOU NOTHIN’” He twirled his tiny cane a few times before tapping the tip of it against her forehead.

            Fiddlefern screamed as her mind was flooded with visions of the future, the sky ripping open, demons pouring out; Sandra—now much older, confronting a giant yellow triangle in a top hat. She saw the past, too. Sandra making her shrine to the triangle, laughing and joking and planning and promising not to tell Fiddlefern anything about him, for fear of exposing his involvement in the project. ‘AND SINCE YOU’VE BEEN SO NICE TO COME VISIT ME, I’LL BE SURE TO COME VISIT YOU SOME DAY, FIDDLEFERN JUNIPER MAE MCCOY HATFIELD MCGUCKET. IT’LL BE A REAL PARTY!” He laughed incredibly loudly, as if it were coming from inside her own head. Her ears rang with it and her mind hummed, even after she was pulled out and tumbled to the ground.

 

            “Fiddlefern!” Sandra scrambled over to her crumpled form and turned her over. The blond’s eyes were dilated and she trembled from head to toe. “What did you see?!”

            “I saw things what no one ought…” she muttered then suddenly convulsed and spoke in what could best be described as ‘tongues’, writhing and mumbling like a Pentecostal preacher. Suddenly, she stopped and sat up, staring out at nothing. _“When Gravity Falls and Earth becomes Sky, fear the Beast with just One Eye…”_

            Sandra put a gentle hand on her shoulder. “Fiddlefern, you’re scaring me. Please, what did you see?”

            Her eyes returned to normal and she frowned deeply. “I saw _enough_ ,” she spat, shrugged her hand off and crawled further away from her. “You _lied_ to me! You and that triangle demon. You’re gonna bring about the end of the world!”

            Sandra gasped as if she’d been punched in the gut and stared hard at her partner, but could find no words.

            Fiddlefern got to her feet. “All this time…” She shook her head and hugged herself. “I fear we’ve unleashed a grave danger on the world. One I’d just as soon _forget_.” She turned her back on the portal and Sandra and walked shakily out of the room.

            “Fiddlefern…” Sandra whispered, not finding the strength to get to her feet. She sat on her folded legs for a few minutes until she heard the disconcerting sound of metal clanging. Her stomach turned, she bolted to her feet, ran into the control room and saw Fiddlefern, screwdriver in hand, arm-deep in the console. Her blood ran hot. “What are you doing?!” Sandra screamed and grabbed her by the shoulders, pulling her with all of her weight. Fiddlefern fell back with her, pulling a fistfull of wires as she went but quickly scrambled on all fours to charge at the control panel once more. Sandra leapt on her and they wrested on the floor. Before she could pry it away, Fiddlefern stabbed Sandra in the arm with the screwdriver. “Stop! Fiddlefern, stop!!” she screamed and pinned her arms to the ground and heard a loud crack as her head smacked against the concrete floor. Only when tears splashed down on her face did the crazed woman’s thrashings cease. Her left eyelid spasmed and her gaze was vacant and angry. Sandra collapsed on top of her, sobbing, and desperately clutching her close to her. Slowly, she realized that the woman she loved was unresponsive to her desperation and she pulled back, pushing herself up on her hands and knees, her wounded arm bleeding through her lab coat sleeve. Fiddlefern turned her head away and pursed her lips tightly.

            “Fiddlefern?” Sandra implored and gently touched her cheek.

            She didn’t flinch, but whispered “Let me go.”

            An awful silence fell. Sandra straightened up then went boneless as Fiddlefern pushed her off and made for the elevator on unsteady feet. Sandra slumped, but caught herself before she fell and watched her go. The doors closed on Fiddlefern and Sandra’s heart shattered.

 

            A few hours passed before Sandra had recovered sufficiently to make the ascent to the house. She wandered from room to room in the twilight, knowing there was no need to call out for them; The McGuckets were gone. Tatom’s plastic dinosaurs sat on the kitchen table as if the child would amble back in to play with them momentarily. The silence and the wound on her arm throbbing in pain made it plain that it was over. In a daze, Sandra found a box and started collecting the toys, books, clothes, and photographs and filed them all neatly away under lock and key.

 

**Gravity Falls, Oregon - November, 1981**

            Tatom McGucket did not know that her real name was Cindy Hatfield. She didn’t remember that her father had tried to kill her and her mother in a psychotic jealous rage. And now she didn’t know why she couldn’t go home.

            The motel they were staying in was cramped and stuffy and it did nothing but rain every day in the early winter in Oregon. Fiddlefern tried to shush her and distract her, but she had her own problems. Feverishly, the engineer worked away at turning the motel TV into a surveillance system. Parts and wires littered the room. A small area had been cordoned off for her daughter, but even that was occasionally violated by an errant screw or washer. Another of these rolled across the thin carpet into her space and the child picked it up and hurled it at her mother with incredible accuracy. It beaned her right on the forehead. “I wanna go home!” she screamed again.

            “We are home, Tater…” Fiddlefern repeated, being struck by the washer fazing her only for a moment.

            “No! I wanna go home with Mommy Sandra!”

            The soldering iron slipped from her hands and she juggled it a few times before catching it again, her dexterity limited by a cast on her arm. Her hair was mussed and wild and she hadn’t changed her clothes in a few days. “You ain’t _got_ no other mommy. _I’m_ your mommy,” she whispered. She squeezed her eyes shut for a moment then sighed and with shaking hands pulled something from a duffel bag on the floor.

            “No! I’m cold and hungry and you’re not nice to me anymore. I want Mommy Sandra!”

            “Ok, my precious Tater-totter, tell you what. You come on over here and we’ll go. Ok?” She keyed some text into the device from the duffel bag. It looked like some sort of sinister water pistol with a light bulb sticking out of the barrel.

            Tatom seemed hesitant and looked from her mother to the scary object in her hand. Fiddlefern put it down on the bed and waved for her to come sit beside her. The little girl stepped over debris, pulled herself up onto the bed and nestled in next to her mother. “See? I ain’t so scary, am I? I love you, Tatom. I do. I’m sorry I cain’t be a good Mommy no more. I’m all broken up in the head now and not worth much of anything to anyone. Tomorrow, some nice people ‘re gonna come and I want you ta be sweet on ‘em, ya hear?”

            “Why?”

            “Because they’re _good_ people. Unlike me and that Sandra.” She pulled the child close, stroked her hair a few times then covered the child’s eyes with her right hand. Tears poured down Fiddlerfern’s face. She picked up the memory erasing gun with her left and fired it at her daughter. Tatom cried out in surprise and her mother dropped the gun which read “Mommy Sandra" and cradled Tatom until they’d both cried themselves to sleep.

 

.x.

            Sandra powered down the last stage of the portal matrix and the room that usually hummed with energy consumption fell silent and dark. The console could not be fully powered down without totally removing it, so it offered a faint glow from the control room. She didn’t flinch as a familiar blue glow illuminated the space.

            “WHAT’S UP, SIXY?” a voice called before the distinctive triangular shape opened his eye. “AWFUL QUIET IN HERE.” Sandra averted her eyes and made to leave. “ARE YOU TRYING TO IGNORE ME? I ASKED YOU A QUESTION.” He spun around and got in her face.

            She gnashed her teeth and did her best to keep her cool. “We’re through, Cipher.”

            “YOU’RE DUMPING ME? SIXY, SAY IT AIN’T SO.” He laughed. “IT ISN’T THAT EASY, PINES. YOU’RE IN THIS FOR THE LONG HAUL, _REMEMBER?”_

            Sandra’s shoulders shook and as she glared at him. “I agreed to let you help me because I trusted you.”

            Cipher mimed filing his nails. “YEAH. I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU WERE SO EASY TO MANIPULATE. I MEAN, JEEZ. YOU NEEDED SOMEONE TO TALK TO SO BADLY YOU WERE WILLING TO LET ME INTO YOUR _MIND_. THEN IT WAS LIKE RIPPING THE SKIN OFF A BABY, REAL EASY PEASY.”

            “I know you took advantage of my vulnerability. I knew it _then_ , but if I had known what your plans were…”

            Cipher’s eye frowned. “YEAH, IF IT WEREN’T FOR THAT MEDDLING ASSISTANT OF YOURS AND YOUR SO-CALLED ‘LOVE’ FOR EACH OTHER THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN HOOK LINE AND SINKER. BUT OH WELL, THAT’S OVER, SO WHADDAYA SAY YOU TURN THIS PUPPY BACK ON AND WE’LL…”

            “No! You _destroyed_ her!” she screamed, no longer fearing what could happen to her if she defied him, and motioned to the inert inverted triangle shape behind them. She trembled with rage. Fiddlefern was gone. She was alone, again. What did any of it matter?

 _“I DID?_ I’M SORRY, WAS _I_ THE ONE WHO INSISTED YOU NEEDED AN ASSISTANT? OR THE ONE WHO DIDN’T TELL THE WOMAN I SUPPOSEDLY LOVED THAT I WAS IN LEAGUE WITH MYSTERIOUS DEMONIC POWERS? NO, PRETTY SURE THAT WAS _YOU_. ALL I DID WAS SHOW HER THE _TRUTH_.”

            Sandra’s jaw hung open. “No,” she breathed, but she knew he was right. It was her fault, her invitation, and her lies about Cipher’s involvement that led to Fiddlefern’s madness. She stared up past Cipher at the portal and shook her head in disbelief.

            He shrugged. “OK, WELL, GUESS YOU’RE DONE NOW. I’LL JUST TAKE BACK THE DRIVER’S SEAT AND…” Cipher swooped down to enter Sandra’s mind but skidded to a halt. He pointed to her head. “WHAT IN THE SEVEN HELLS IS THAT?”

            Sandra pushed back her hair, revealing a fresh set of stitches on her scalp. “A Bill-proof barrier. You’re never taking me over again,” she muttered and sneered at him, satisfied that she’d thwarted him at last.

            Cipher laughed. It was not the response she had hoped for. “FINE. I CAN’T GET IN YOUR HEAD, BUT IF YOU THINK I’M GOING TO TAKE IT EASY ON YOUR _DREAMS…_ ”

            Sandra shook her head. “Your abilities in this world are limited by the stars, Cipher. I know that now. As long as I keep you out of my mind and this portal shut down, you have no agency! Go ahead! Infect my dreams! You’re impotent!”

            Cipher’s aspect glowed red. “OH YEAH? WANNA GUESS HOW LONG IT’LL TAKE ME TO GET ANOTHER SUCKER TO SHAKE MY HAND? HUH?” Sandra clenched her teeth and stood her ground, refusing to be cowed. NO? NOT TALKING TO ME, ANYMORE EITHER, HUH? THAT’S BORING BUT FINE BY ME. UNPLEASANT DREAMS!” His voice and manic laugh boomed in the cavernous space and in a flash he was gone.

            “Fiddlefern,” Sandra breathed, and bolted for the elevator.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew! Finally to the end of the "Tale of Two Stans" part of the story. Back to the 'present' of 2012 in the next chapter.

            Sandra drove into town and sat in her ‘79 Buick in a parking lot for a little while, trying to gather her courage. In all the years she’d lived in Gravity Falls, she’d rarely made the trip into town. Too many bad experiences with strangers everywhere she’d ever gone teasing and whispering about her deformed hands had scarred her sufficiently to want to keep her distance from other humans. Fiddlefern had brought her out of her shell a little, but Sandra agreed to go to town with her only because she wasn’t alone and she could keep her hands in her pockets and let Fiddlefern do any transacting or door-opening. Now, Sandra had to find her and somehow apologize and explain things to her, but without her support, the idea of walking up and down the street and talking to strange people had her frozen in her seat with fear.

            “I have to do this. For her. Because I love her. Because she deserves the truth,” Sandra pursed her lips. “Even if after she hears it she doesn’t want me back.” She got out of the car, stuffed her hands deep in the pockets of her long jacket and started searching.

            After about an hour, the sun had set and the street lights flickered to life. She’d asked dozens of people who either didn’t know who Fiddlefern McGucket was, or were not sure where she lived. Sandra was just about to give up when three hooded figures darted out of an alley near the Gravity Falls museum and grabbed her. One put a cloth to her face. Though she struggled, in moments she lost consciousness as they carried her into the alleyway.

 

            When she came to, Sandra blinked in disbelief. Around here were more hooded figures of various sizes, but one man had lowered his hood, revealing a bald, tattooed skull and a scarred, ruined right eye. “Welcome, Dr. Sandra Pines, to the Society of the Blind Eye,” he said, maliciously. “We understand you are looking for something you must not find.”

            She looked down and saw that she was well strapped into a chair. Even her head was tied down, limiting her vision. Her eyes darted around, taking in the room, a windowless tomb of a place, covered with familiar symbols. “Oh no. Fiddlefern!” she shouted.

            “Precisely,” the bald man said and entered ‘Fiddlefern McGucket’ into the interface of an ornate sort of firearm. Its design, as well as that of some of the equipment in her view had a distinctive style she recognized immediately.

            “What are you going to do? Let me go!” Sandra struggled in her restraints.

            He leveled the gun at her face. “You will unsee what has been seen. You will forget her, Sandra Pines.”

            “What? No! No, please!!” One of the smaller hooded figures took a few steps back and Sandra screamed her name again. “Fiddlefern! I know you’re here! I need to tell you something! I didn’t know what he was planning! I’m sorry I lied to you, but I didn’t know, I…!” Her words devolved into a scream as the memory-erasing gun fired directly into her face. When it was over, Sandra’s shoulders relaxed a little. “Fiddlefern,” she hissed through clenched teeth. “I _will not_ forget you,”

            Blind Ivan knocked his palm against the gun. “This thing broken?” he asked, turning to his compatriots.

            Sandra laughed. “I believe I’ve rendered myself impervious to your ray,” she said confidently, realizing the plate in her head must have deflected the beam. “Whaddaya know? An added bonus for the trouble.”

            Blind Ivan saw the short hooded figure that he had posed his question to tremble and whispered something to them. “No matter,” he said. “I can make it so you can never _look_ for her again!” he shouted, and pulled a small wood-handled knife from his robes. He leaned slowly toward Sandra, the gleaming tip of the sharp blade growing ever closer to her right eye.

            “What? No! You can’t gouge out my eyes!” Sandra squirmed, but couldn’t free herself from the bonds.

            “Oh, I think you’ll find that I can.”

            Sandra screamed for Fiddlefern, but no one moved to help her. When the tip was nearly touching her eye, Sandra fainted.

            .x.

            When she woke, Sandra was crumpled up in the alleyway in the dark. She cried out and put her hands to her face. Her eyes were intact. Somewhere down the alley, a man laughed. Scrambling to her feet, Sandra upset a metal trashcan and it clattered and echoed off the adjacent buildings as she ran away.

            .x.

            In a few days, the house at 618 Gopher Rd. was rigged with razor wire and security cameras. Sandra had an army surplus company deliver rations for the next sixty years and got to work constructing a bunker in the wooded portion of the property. Twice, she saw hooded figures approach the house, but they turned and fled when she threatened them with a crossbow. Meanwhile, her dreams were shattered in the most literal sense of the phrase. Her life’s work was as good as gone—corrupted by evil; her love was gone—and currently trying to erase her from her mind forever; her sanity was gone—every night her subconscious was visited by a psychotic triangle who delighted in showing her the most horrific images and playing out the most heart-wrenching stories. The very first night after her traumatic experience with the Society of the Blind Eye, she dreamed of her home in Glass Shard Beach, New Jersey. Her teenaged-self walked down the hall looking for her sister, when she felt something wet. Looking down at her hand, she saw red and there on the wall, her mother’s crucifix dripped with blood, but rather than Jesus, Sandi Pines was stretched on the cross. “Forgive her, mother. She knew not what she did,” Sandi said, eyes to the heavens.

            The dreams were so real and though Sandra tried to meditate or medicate herself enough to try to alter them or at least retain her consciousness while undergoing their traumatizing scenarios, Cipher always managed to terrify her. Soon, the hours she spent sleeping reduced to a few here and a few there. She knew that humans needed sleep to survive, but what else could she do? Sleep and have her sanity peeled away by Cipher? Or forgo sleep and watch herself unravel in the waking world? She began to write everything in code, but knew by his taunts that there was very little that Cipher didn’t see. If she didn’t do something drastic soon, Sandra knew she wouldn’t be able to hold on. A plan began to form and a short while into the New Year, with all hope lost, Sandra Pines reached out to the one person left in the world whom she felt she could trust.

 

**Las Vegas, February, 1982**

            As the Seventies had drawn to a close, Sandi Pines learned the fine art of sleight of hand and prestidigitation from her able employers. Through them, she found friends in the gay community in Las Vegas who didn’t care or who were actually impressed that she had once been in porn. Through that community’s night-life, she also found a taste for dancing into the wee hours of the night and fell in with the hardyest of partiers. For a while, she thought she was having fun. She thought she’d found real friends. It wasn’t until the fun she was having started affecting her work that she realized she had neither.

            King begged her to get clean, and she tried, but going out and getting drunk and high was the only thing Sandi really had besides work. Any attempts at dating were thwarted by men recognizing her and either expecting certain things or being scared off by them. When the thrill of performing was over for the day it was either go party or sit alone at home and dwell on her crushing loneliness. If she tried to stay away from the clubs, she found she just brought coke home, and doing lines on her coffee table alone satisfied only the bodily ache, not the hole in her soul. So she did more and more, until her finances dried up, her health deteriorated, and Richard & King let her go.

 

            Sandi sat on her couch and held her head in her hands. The coke was gone, her cash was nearly dried up, but she could still afford a cheap drunk. There was no way she was going to make rent again and so when the knock came at the door she threw the thick, now empty glass at it. It cracked in two and the halves clattered across the floor. “I don’t have your money, Rita! You’re gonna hafta drag me outta here!” But no one broke the door down. Instead, a postcard slipped through the mail slot and floated a little toward her. She pushed herself off the couch and stumbled toward it.

            “Please come…” she read. _“Sandra?”_

 

.x.

            The fact that her Pontiac made it through the snow to a shack in the woods in the middle-of-nowhere Oregon amazed and impressed Sandi Pines. “Good old Sandi Mobile. I don’t know what’d I do without ya,” she said, put it in park and patted the dashboard affectionately. “Now, a little liquid courage.” She pulled a flask out of the flimsy second-hand pink winter coat with white fur trim that she picked up when she crossed the border and remembered what winter was like, and took a long pull. She got out of the car and stepped into the snow wearing leggings and converse sneakers and hurried to Sandra’s front door. A very small path had been dug out, but not recently, and it had already started to fill with snow again. She edged around the opening in the razor wire, her coat snagging a little on a barb, and started to wonder if she’d gotten the right place. “Screw it. I gotta get warm!” She leapt up onto the porch and stomped the snow from her feet. “Ok. You haven’t seen your sister in over ten years. She’s family. She won’t bite. Right?” Sandi raised a mittened hand to knock and the door swung quickly open.

            Sandra Pines leveled a crossbow at the woman on the porch. “Who’s there?! Have you come to steal my eyes?!”

            “Jumped up Christ, Sandra! It’s me! Put that thing down!”

            “Sandi? Did anyone follow you?” she asked and looked over her shoulder.

            “No, you kook! You asked me to come here so I did!” She gave her the once over and sneered at her sister’s disheveled appearance and dark-circled eyes. She took a step back. “You seem busy. I’ll just turn right around and…”

            “No, no. Yes. I did ask for you. Please. Come in.”

            Sandi hesitated, but stepped cautiously into the a-frame house and was disappointed to find that the inside wasn’t much warmer than out. Sandra’s strange behavior, though less aggressive, continued to set Sandi on edge as she shined a penlight in her eyes, apologizing that she was just being certain of something or other. With each step further into the house she took, Sandi felt she was getting further and further away from safety and sanity. “You ok? You’re spazzier than mom after her tenth cup of coffee.”

            “Not really,” Sandra admitted, rubbing her knuckles—a sign of nervousness that her sister recognized from their childhood. “I’ve made some huge mistakes and you’re the only one I can trust.”

            Sandi’s heart twisted. “Hey,” she said and put her hand on her shoulder. “I seen some messed up stuff. Whatever you got goin’ on, I can handle.”

            Sandra shook her head and stepped away from her. “I better just show you. Follow me,” she said and wove her way around piles of paper, boxes, and detritus that littered the house. The secret vending machine door should have been the sign that told Sandi to run, but morbid curiosity pulled her down the stairs like a rubbernecker to a fatal car crash.

 

            “Ok, I _cannot_ handle this,” she said as she gaped at the inverted triangle shape of the portal. Sandra explained what it was and how she’d come to believe that it was a danger to the entire universe and turned to face her with a book full of her notes held tightly in her deformed hands. She extended her arms and held it out for her. “I need you to take this book and drive away—far away—don’t tell me where—and hide it.”

            Sandi took the book and blinked at her. “That’s it? That’s what you wanted me here for? You’re joking, right?”

            “It’s very important, Sandi, please!”

            “What you find important is so far detached from reality it’s not even funny! You want me to help? Why? Because I did such a good job at it the last time I tried?”

            Sandra raised a brow. “What do you mean?”

            Sandi laughed, darkly. “Seriously? You know what? Never mind. I’ll get rid of this for ya, _right now.”_ She reached into the pocket of her jacket, pulled out a zippo lighter, flicked it to life and held it under a corner of the book.

            “What?! No! My research!” Sandra screamed and tried to pull the book away from her.

            Sandi wrenched it away and jogged back toward the elevator, but Sandra caught her in the doorway between the portal room and the control room, tripped her up and tried to pull the journal away. “Give it back!” she growled, eyes wild.

            “Nuh-uh! It’s mine now!” Sandi fell against the control panel and Sandra put her foot in the middle of her chest and pushed. Sandi screamed as the other-worldly red-hot vent cover seared through her light-weight jacket and into her flesh.

            “Oh my gosh Sandi I’m so sorry, are you—?” She gasped, snapping out of her rage, but the action had the opposite effect on her sister. Sandi charged at her twin, tears in her eyes, fists flying. They tussled in the control room, elbows knocking into switches.

            “You haven’t changed at all! You’re still so wrapped up in what _you_ think is important!” she screamed. Sandra tried to back away from her, rolled into the portal room and landed on a large lever. The entire room hummed with energy and the giant triangle behind her arched with blue sparks. “I’m done trying to help you. You just do what _you_ want, what _you_ think is right without ever askin’ anybody if they agree with you!” She spat as her sister got to her feet, just a foot over the black-and-yellow line. “You think this book is so important? You can have it!” She extended her arms and pushed the book at Sandra. It took her brain a moment to process what she was seeing. Rather than falling over, Sandra fell up. The look of horror on her face sent ice through Sandi’s veins.

            “Sandi, do something!”

            “What’s happening? Sandra!” Sandi looked around but the basement room was tidy (unlike the house above it). Had there been a rope or even a broom or something nearby, she might have been able to catch her. Sandra looked behind her at the aperture as it gaped open. “Sandi! Help me!” she screamed, threw the book at her, and in seconds was dragged through head-first. When her feet had vanished, the portal grew dark, the needles fell to zero, and the room was plunged into silence. A pair of perfectly round glasses clattered to the foor.

            Sandi cried out for her sister and tried to move the lever they had pushed, but nothing responded. She fell to her knees and sat there for a long while, observing the details of the room as if in a dream. Not far from where she sat was a large backpack and a little yellow notepad. Sandi crawled over to them and tried to read from the pad. A list of symbols she didn’t recognize were bulleted under one two-symbol word. Some of the items were crossed out. In the bag, she found several changes of underwear, two shirts, a pair of pants, some weird gizmos, a blank notebook, pens and pencils, a compass, a knife, and many more things that gave the impression that Sandra was packing for some sort of camping trip. Sandi kicked the bag as hard as she could and cursed at it. She cursed her sister, cursed fate, cursed the throbbing burn on her back, and her broken, empty heart.

 

            Sandi could have cut her losses and run far away, but with no money and a firm desire not to rely on men ever again, there was nowhere left for her to go. She couldn’t go home; in such close proximity there was no way she could keep her past from her parents, and Glass Shard Beach was close enough to The City that it wouldn’t be long before the bad habits she’d left in Vegas killed her.

            She lay down to sleep that night on a jury-rigged bandage made from paper towels and scotch tape and watched the snow fall, back-lit by a huge security flood light trained on the yard. She clutched the journal with her sister’s handprint on the cover to her chest and peered at the falling snow through her discarded glasses. She didn’t get much sleep that night. Or the night after that.


	7. Chapter 7

**Gravity Falls - August, 2012**

            “Morning, Grantie Sandi!” Dipper chimed as she entered the kitchen, dressed and ready for the day in her usual uniform of shorts, vest and ‘pine tree’ hat. Her brother trailed not far behind, rubbing sleep from his eyes, still in his mismatched dinosaur pajamas; the top bright red with green raptors and the bottoms blue with yellow stegosaurus.

            “Morning,” she grunted and plated the last of a huge stack of pancakes. She wore what she usually paraded around the house in: a tank top, shorts, and smelly green slippers—today topped by a bathrobe.

            “Is Great Aunt Sandra awake yet?”

            “No.” Sandi rolled her eyes then turned to take her seat at the table. “Say, Dipper. I need to ask you and your brother a favor.”

            Abel had already stuffed an entire pancake into his mouth but mumbled “Sure!” around it.

            “Ok,” Dipper said, cautiously.

            “Stay outta my sister’s hair for a while. She’s got a lotta science crap she’s gotta deal with down there and her sleep’s not so good. She might not come up until night time and when she does she’ll probably be exhausted so, just, go easy on the ‘billion questions’, ok?”

            “Oh, ok.” Dipper looked over at her brother who wiggled his eyebrows and waved his fork to point at Sandi. She made a face at him. “Sandi, I didn’t really get a chance to apologize to you yesterday. If I had only _known…_ ”

            Sandi swallowed a bite and washed it down with coffee. “You couldn’t have. That’s moot, Kid. Don’t worry about it.”

            “But I do worry! I thought you were a terrible person! But it turns out you gave thirty years of your life to get your twin back!”

            Abel stopped eating and his eyes moved from Dipper to Sandi and back again.

            “So, I’m sorry I thought you were a bad guy. What you did was amazing.”

            Sandi scoffed. “It’s only great ‘cause it _worked_. Imagine if that thing went off and bupkis?”

            Dipper laughed, a little awkwardly, but she laughed. Abel smiled and asked for more pancakes.

 

            After breakfast, Dipper asked to go walk into town to check out the damage caused by the gravity being turned off and Abel and Waddles sat down in the living room to write home to the twins’ parents. Right on time, Sues showed up for work, tool belt jingling.

            “Take the day off,” Sandi croaked.

            “What?” Sues cocked her head to the side. “Miss Pines, you feelin’ ok?”

            “You heard me. There’s a lot to be done, but my sister needs to do some stuff and I think it’s best if we let her play with her house herself, today.”

            Sues brightened. “Oh sure! Good idea! Guess I’ll see if the guys in my FCLORP group are free.”

            Sandi shook her head. “I’m not even gonna ask. Oh, there is one thing you can do, uh…” She scratched the back of her head. “I need you to clean out your new break room. It’s, uh… Well, ya see, it’s…”

            Sues’ face fell. “Oh my god. I am so sorry. I’ll get my junk out right away, Miss Pines!” She turned and bolted for her ‘break room’.

            “Wait! Sues…!” Sandi barked and hurried after her. When she caught up, Sues was already yanking down posters and piling her things (there weren’t many) onto the couch.

            “I am so sorry, Miss Pines,” she repeated. “I didn’t take anything out. There were some sciency doodads and stuff I moved in this box and stuck it over here, I’ll put it back just where it was…”

            “Would you stop panicking? It’s ok!”

            “No it’s not!” Sues shouted and abruptly stopped her manic behavior. “It’s _not_ ok. You sealed off this room on purpose and stupid me I opened it up and we were playing in here and messing around and I put my dumb posters up and the whole time you didn’t say a word! You couldn’t give away your secret but it must have hurt _so bad!”_

            Sandi grimaced and tried to mutter something dismissive, even as Sues’ words cleaved her heart.

            “So I’m sorry,” Sues said, turning to face her. She put her hands on Sandi’s shoulders. “I never want to make you sad, Miss Pines. Even by accident.”

            Usually, Sandi would balk at Sues’ less-than-subtle signs of filial affection, but after the events of the last twenty-four hours, and in light of the young woman’s tear-stained face, Sandi was obliged to take it. “Ok,” she said. “I don’t think you need forgiveness, but if you want it, you got it.”

            Sues beamed and quickly pulled her employer into a tight hug. She gasped as she felt Sandi’s arms fold around her, squeeze her tightly, clap her on the back a few times then gently push her away. “Ok. That’s plenty of that. Uh… take your time gettin’ your stuff together and, uh… you can put it in a corner of my office. We’ll figure somethin’ else out later, ok?”

            Sues wiped her face with the bottom of her staff shirt. “Sure thing, Miss Pines!”

            As her Gal Friday got to work, Sandi looked at the ornately carved door to her sister’s room as if seeing it for the first time. She took a deep breath and moved slowly down the hall. “Ok, universe. I got the message. I’ll do it. _I won’t like it,_ but I’ll do it.”

 

.x.

            She must have been alerted to the sound of the elevator coming down, because when Sandi exited it, Sandra was waiting for her. She had her hands on her hips and a level pout on her lips. “Something the matter?” she asked, a little coldly.

            “I, uh, just thought I’d check on ya,” Sandi muttered and put the plate with the ham sandwich on it that she’d brought down on a counter to her left. “Wanted to make sure you were doin’ ok.”

            Sandra sighed. She turned to get back to work. “The sentiment is appreciated, but not necessary.”

            Sandi watched her turn but didn’t see her brows pinch together as her sister faced her work once more. She glanced from the back of Sandra’s head to the unwanted sandwich that would surely become desiccated in the coming hours and be thrown away. Her shoulders tensed even tighter than usual and she shook her head. “You haven’t changed one bit,” Sandi snarled, bile rising. “No, forget that. You’ve gotten _worse_.”

            Sandra’s response came almost a whisper. “How’s that?”

            “You’re still so self-centered.”

            Sandra slammed the unusual tool she’d been working with down and spun around, taking the bait. “Selfish. _Me?_ That’s rich.”

            “Yes, _you!”_ Sandi pointed and rounded on her. “What do you think I been doing here for the last thirty years? I gave three decades of my life trying to bring you back, studying physics and crap and bangin’ my fists on this fucking console day in and day out…”

            Her twin’s face flushed. “You studied, huh? Then you must have some idea of what you’ve done! You wanted your ‘self-centered’ sister back so badly?  If it weren’t for your own stubborn, selfish desire I wouldn’t be feverishly scraping bits of interdimensional residue off the walls! This stuff is dangerous, Sandi! _End-of-the-world dangerous!_ ”

            “Well, sor~ry!” Sandi shouted back.

            “You _should_ be! When I asked you to come here I was a week away from shutting this thing down behind me, _permanently!”_ Bits of spit flew from Sandra’s mouth as her voice grew louder. This seemed to startle the scientist and she wiped a finger over her lips and tried to take a few calming breaths.

            Sandi blanched. “What?”

            “What happened when I disappeared, Sandi? The portal ran out of juice didn’t it? I _planned for it_ to do that!”

            _“What…?”_ Sandi lowered her chin and stared at her sister in disbelief. A memory of a backpack filled with clothes and tools and a coded checklist sitting near the portal flashed in her mind and she clenched her jaw, tightly.

            “I wanted to go and never come back. If you had just listened to me and taken the journal with you, then…”

            “Bullshit!” Sandi shouted, startling her.

            “Is it so hard to believe that I’m a terrible person? I’m the one who _ruined your life,_ remember? The one who you wouldn’t speak to for a decade?”

            “The door swings both ways, Sandra. What about the Christmas of seventy-five, huh? You were supposed to come home!”

            “There was an expert in cryptozoology in residence and he was leaving in a week, if I had left, I wouldn’t have finished my dissertation in time!”

            “Blah blah blah! All I hear is that you don’t care! That was our last chance to make up, and you ditched me! Damn it, Sandra, all our young lives I was the one stickin’ up for you, protectin’ you from kids that made fun of you, bein’—as you said multiple times—your _only_ friend, and the _one time_ I needed you to support me, what did I get? You tell my boyfriend to break up with me!”

            Sandra’s eyes widened and she was hot again. “This is about Carl McCorkle? _Seriously?”_

“No! It’s about _everything!_ It’s about us being sisters, about how much I love you, and how you’ve never once really given a shit about me!”

            Sandi’s reaction time was not what it once was and she lurched forward as Sandra grasped her by her tank top and shook her. “Why do you care?! I have done nothing but destroy the people I’ve cared about! You, Fiddlefern, even myself! And now I’ve even brought extreme danger to Dipper and Abel! You’re right, Sandi, you’re absolutely right. I am a self-centered asshole and you should have _let me go!”_

            Sandi’s brows curved upwards and she stared into her sister’s glistening brown eyes and she had but one word for her. “No.” She wrapped her arms around the bundle of nerves in the shape of her sister and held her tightly. Sandra let a sharp squeak of a gasp escape and froze in place. “No. _Never_. I get it now.” Sandra went slightly limp, her hands relaxed but her arms were folded against her chest and pressed tightly to her sister in an awkward and vulnerable position. Sandi rested her chin on her shoulder and spoke softly and clearly into her left ear. “I learned something recently, after that dopey kid Sues latched on ta me, that when you got family that loves you, you forfeit the right to go it alone. It was my job to hold you up and I failed. I was so concerned about holding you _back_ that I let you _go_. You didn’t fail me—I failed you. I’m sorry, Sandra. Please forgive me.” Sandi held her sister firmly and waited. In moments, she felt her shaking as Sandra sobbed into her shoulder. “It’s ok. You got your family, now. We’re here for you. That’s what we’re for.”

            Sandra nodded and sniffled, quietly accepting her twin’s kindness. “Thank you…love you…’m sorry…” she mumbled, just loud enough for Sandi to hear and she sighed with relief.

            After several long moments when she’d composed herself again, Sandra pulled away gently, wiped her eyes and cleaned her glasses. “You really studied?” she asked.

            “Shit, yeah I did.” Sandi smirked and put her hands on her hips. “Can I help with the, uh… interdimensional goo, or whatever?”

            Sandra gave her a sleepy, lopsided grin. “That would be great.”

 

.x.

            The Pines Twins worked for hours to clean up the fallout from the portal activation. They did their best to contain a rift in spacetime that had formed from the debris and seal it in what looked like a sci-fi snow globe. They locked it in a cabinet, surrounded by instruments to measure its stability then shared the ham sandwich Sandi had brought down and chatted as the readings came in.

            Sandi put her feet up on the control panel, not far from where she’d been burned thirty years before. “So, what happens now?” she asked.

            Sandra raised a brow. “You’ll have to be more specific, Dee.”

            “Well, assuming we keep the world from ending, what happens after that? I mean, for me?” She glanced over at her with a shy look.

            Sandra folded her arms and shrugged. “Whatever you like, I suppose. You don’t have to hang around here anymore if that’s what you mean.”

            “What if I _want_ to?”

            A grin spread slowly across Sandra’s face. “You’d want to stay here?”

            “I don’t got much of anything else to do…”

            “Of course you can!” Sandra rolled her chair over to her sister’s and collided with it like a bumper car. “You’ve lived here three times as long as I have; it’s almost more your place than mine.”

            “But I took your bedroom and the museum and crap take up so much space—”

            “Dee, I have these floors plus the bunker and I can make more space if I need to.”

            “Bunker?”

            “Oh, that’s right. It’s in the third journal so you wouldn’t have found it. We’ll have to figure out how to run a tourist attraction as well as a clandestine scientific research facility, though.”

            “I been doing that for thirty years already, and I’m good at this—runnin’ the Shack. I paid your friggin’ mortgage all these years, hell I paid it off two years ago!” Sandi stated proudly.

            “The mortgage was only something like fifty thousand, why didn’t you just cash in my CDs?”

            Sandi’s face went white. “CDs? You don’t mean compact discs, do you?”

            “Compact what? No. Certificates of deposit. I had a couple in a bank in California. Ooh, I wonder what they’re at now…”

            Sandi clutched the arms of the chair and tried not to throw up. “Jumped up Christmas.”

            Sandra laughed and clapped her on the knee. “No worries about money, then, eh?”

            Sandi chuckled, delirious at the thought of such a windfall. “Anything else you got hidden away I should know about?”

            “Hm, perhaps. Though not fiscal. There is something I had better show you before you see it by accident. I’m not used to living in close quarters so I might forget one day and scare you.” Sandra stood and crossed her hands over her torso, taking the bottom of her sweater in both hands she pulled it up over her head. “These are pretty old, but there’s a lot of them.”

            “Holy Christ,” Sandi muttered and took in the numerous scars that marked her sister’s arms.

            “There’s more under the t-shirt,” Sandra said. “But you get the idea.”

            “What…happened?”

            “Oh, lots of things.” She sighed. “Some worlds weren’t very friendly. Some were just wild and there was no medicine or hospital to be found. Most of the wounds are from twenty years ago. I became more agile and cautious once I got close to forty.” She saw Sandi’s face darken and crouched down in front of her. “Stop. I know what you’re thinking. This is not your fault.”

            “But it is…”

            “No it’s not. No it _is not._ There’s a lot to it, a lot of mistakes I made before you even got here. This portal and everything about it was my biggest mistake. I put my trust in someone I should not have trusted and…” Sandra shuddered. Could she even say his name? She did her best to suppress even his image from her mind.

            Sandi’s eyes were suddenly fierce. She clapped a hand on her shoulder. “Who hurt you?”

            Sandra hung her head. “No one. It was my doing.”

            “Don’t lie to me, who hurt you?”

            “It’s just that if I hadn’t been so weak…”

            “Who, Sandra? I’ll kill him myself!”

            Her head shot up and she gawked at her sister’s reddened face. She laughed, surprised. “I’m not trying to lie to you, I’m just not sure I want to talk about it just yet. It’s not a him, per se. It’s complicated. Suffice to say I trusted someone and was betrayed, then someone placed their trust in me and I…destroyed them.” Sandra shuddered and hugged herself.

            “Shit.”

            “Shit, indeed.” She stood back up and put her sweater back on. “How about you? Anyone wreck you? Besides me, of course.”

            “Sandra…”

            She waved her hand and apologized for making light.

            “I destroyed myself. Pretty literally. I fucked up my life so bad that when I decided I had to become you in order to get you back, it was the perfect way to just throw it all away. Sandi Pines disappeared into the desert one day and never came back. When Mom called looking for me here, ‘Sandra’ said she hadn’t heard from her.”

            Sandra put her hand over her mouth. “Was it that bad?”

            “Yeah,”

            “If you had just called me…”

            Sandi laughed. “Oh, no. I couldn’t have. You wouldn’t have recognized me. And _you_ didn’t call _me_ when you were dealing with your shit, either, right?”

            “Not until it was too late.”

            “Oh, right.” She frowned. “But I’ll tell ya, you saved me.”

            Sandra looked up and cocked a brow at her. “How’s that?”

            “I was as good as dead. If I hadn’t left Vegas when I did, I’d be tits up in a potter’s field.”

            “Sandi…”

            “I’m not joking, Sandra! I was in over my head with…stuff.”

            Sandra wove her fingers between Sandi’s, the extra digit wrapping around the outside of her pinky, and smiled kindly on her. She didn’t have to speak a single word to comfort her.

            “Heh,” Sandi chuckled lightly. “Forty years I’ve been waitin’ to feel this again,” she said choking up, and squeezed back.


	8. Chapter 8

            Dipper paced in front of the vending machine in a tight, five-step pattern. Left, right, left, right, left—pivot. Abel sat on the counter of the Mystery Shack gift shop and kicked his feet, letting his sneakers bounce against the side in time with his sister’s pacing. Left, t-tappitta, right, t-tappitta. “Ugh, come on, Sister-mine, let’s go do something. What about that nerd game you got in town? You were so psyched about it until you heard they’d been down there for hours.”

            “Yeah, yeah. We can play later,” Dipper waved to her brother. She shoved her hands deep into the pockets of her shorts and hunched her shoulders. “What could they be doing down there? And why did Great Aunt Sandra change the code?”

            “Duh-hoi, Dip-dop. To keep us out! You heard Grantie Sandi, she needs to clean down there. She doesn’t need us messing things up. I mean, what if the portal _is_ also a doomsday device like the agents said?”

            “Oh my gosh. What if they’re dead!” Dipper cried and stopped pacing.

            Abel slapped his hand to his forehead.

            Both of their attentions were drawn to the sound of voices coming from the stairwell behind the machine. “Listen, they’re screaming! Oh no! Great Aunt Sandra!!” Dipper shouted and pounded on the machine. In a moment, it swung open and the older set of Pines twins stumbled out. Sandi’s fez fell off as she almost fell down, spinning around, putting her back to the wall and sliding down it. Her eyes were red-rimmed and she gasped and sputtered. Both women were breathless and coughing but wore huge grins. When Sandra had caught her breath sufficiently she paused and glanced at her sister who pursed her lips tightly.

            “Oh no, don’t you dare not again Sandi I can’t breathe!”

            Sandi Pines blew a raspberry and burst out laughing. Her laugh was unlike anything Dipper or Abel had heard issue from their great aunt’s mouth before, a barking, high-pitched squeal of a laugh that was echoed perfectly in tone and rhythm by her long-lost twin who clutched her sides, unable to stop the escalation of hysterics. The younger Pines twins watched them with jaws agape as they did their best to calm down. In a little while the pitch and frequency of the laughter dropped off until they were no longer in synch and finally recovering from what Abel later aptly described to Sues as an ‘epic case of the punchies’.

            “Ok. What is so funny?!” Abel demanded, fists clenched tightly in expectation.

            “Well,” Sandra panted. “We were re-modulating the ten-cycle parser and I nudged it and…”

            “It went _boi-yoi-yoi-yoi-yoi-yoing!”_ Sandi shouted.

            “Ah! And I said _‘don’t DO that!’”_

            They dissolved into puddles of giggles for another two solid minutes. “Oh my god I am so tired!” Sandra exclaimed and wiped tears from her eyes.

            The younger twins were slightly irritated that the source of the humor was an inscrutable decades-old inside-joke that even after its origin was explained meant nothing to them. “Ya had to be there,” Sandi admitted. It was the first time she had thought of that joke in forty years and the glow she felt from such raucous laughter lasted her all day.

 

.x.

            It had been a long day. Fairly early in the evening, Sandi told Sandra to call it a night. She could hide her exhaustion from the kids and Soos fairly well, but Sandi saw right through her. When she closed the door, Sandra slumped against it, bone tired and trembling. The weight of the day crashed down on her hard and she struggled to push herself away from the ornate wooden door and stagger toward the couch on the window side of the room. Sandi had made it up with sheets, blankets, and pillows for her and she fell onto it heavily, fully clothed. It would be light outside for another few hours, but the skies were grey with the anticipation of rain and the pale light didn’t hinder her descent into sleep. Sandra Pines closed her eyes and got the first solid, dreamless night’s sleep she’d gotten in years.

 

            It was light when she woke, and raining gently; the water beat a soft rhythm on the glass to her left. Still dazed with half-sleep Sandra watched the rain for a few moments through unfocused eyes, then reached for her glasses on the sill and remembered that she was now fifty-eight years old—that she hadn’t just crashed on the couch after a long night of research—and though the room looked just as it had thirty years before, the life she once knew was gone, forever. She curled up and pulled the blanket over her head and worked for several minutes to repress the surge of memories and emotions she knew she could do nothing about. When at last she’d calmed herself, Sandra rose, found a change of clothes from a neatly stacked pile that Sandi had unearthed from items she’d left behind, and slinked off to the bathroom.

 

            By the time she was showered, calm, and presentable, the kitchen was bustling with activity. Abel operated a blender, crafting some sort of glittery punch. Dipper had all three journals stacked on the kitchen table and was excitedly reading one of the entries from the first volume to her brother. Sandi was making pancakes dressed only in a pair of knit shorts and a tank top—the top of the heat-vent scar showing for anyone to see. Sandra quickly averted her eyes and faked a smile.

            “Hey, hey!” Sandi chimed. “Look who’s alive!”

            “Great Aunt Sandra!” Dipper cheered. “Did you really sleep for twelve hours?”

            She gave a small wave of greeting. “If time moves in this dimension as it should, it would appear that I did.”

            Dipper looked to Sandi with large, puppy dog eyes. “Alright, alright, sheesh. Since she’s rested, yes, you can ask.”

            “Can I ask you some questions about Gravity Falls, please Great Aunt Sandra?!”

            She chuckled a little. “Sure. How about after breakfast we sit down together for a little while?”

            “Yes! Thank you!” Dipper hugged the journal tightly and bounced in her seat.

            Abel sat down beside her and drank his juice through a crazy straw. “Serious nerd session, ahoy!” he shouted.

            “Good, and while they’re doin’ that, you can help me fix up the museum, Abel.”

            “Oh, yay.” He deflated.

            “Ok, who wants pancakes?” she asked. “Sand, can you get the plates out since you’re right there?”

            Sandra looked up to the kitchen cabinets. “I don’t know if I remember where they are.”

            “I pro’lly moved ‘em on ya anyway. Middle one.”

            She nodded and opened the cabinet door. “I should hope so. It’s weird enough that you kept my room just as it had…been…” She stood very still, staring into the cabinet, one hand on the handle, the other moving slowly toward something inside.

            “What’s that, Sand…?” Her sister asked over her shoulder, flipping a pancake.

            Sandra’s mouth hung open slightly as she retrieved something small from the cupboard. The bowl of the little ceramic cup was hugged by a bunny and the glaze looked as if it were painted by an amateur hand.

            “Was hopin’ you’d explain what the heck that ugly thing is!” Sandi laughed and went back to flipping.

            Sandra clutched the strange little thing in her hands and didn’t take her eyes off of it. “It’s an egg cup. It belonged to my…my assistant’s daughter.”

            Dipper perked up. “Oh, it’s McGucket’s daughter’s? Did they live here or something?”

            Sandra’s eyes widened. If the crack in her mental façade was audible it would have been heard for miles. “You know her?”

            Her sister raised a brow but didn’t turn from her cooktop. “Old Woman McGucket was your assistant?”

_“Old…?”_

            Abel stood and put his drink down. His mouth pursed into a tight, thin line. He observed his aunts and sister as one does a glass that’s falling too far out of reach to catch. “That’s just what people call her…” he offered.

            Too late.

            “Where is she now?” Sandra asked, still staring down at the cup in her hand.

            Abel opened his mouth to answer, but his sister cut him off. “She’s probably in the junkyard where she lives.” It wasn’t until Sandra hurried out of the room without another word that Dipper realized she’d said something wrong. “Oh, no!” she cried and hit herself on the head with the journal. “I am such an idiot!” Abel put his hand on her shoulder.

            “You and me, both, kiddo,” Sandi grumbled as she heard her Pontiac peel out down the road.

            With tears in her eyes, Dipper pushed away from the table and ran to the attic, leaving her breakfast behind. “Dipper!” Abel called as he chased after her.

            Sandi sighed, took the last of the pancakes from the griddle and sat down to eat, alone.

 

.x.

            Sandra stood in the rain just outside the ramshackle structure in the center of the junkyard. The words “Mc Suck It” were spray-painted on the corrugated iron wall facing her. A chimney sprouted from the roof and billowed white smoke. She stepped as if drawn forward by invisible hands toward the doorless opening. Inside, a thin, old woman with long, wild, white hair was tending a pot full of something putrid hanging over the fire. Surrounding her, piles of junk and electronics (some functioning, most not) were crowded precariously. A huge, fat raccoon squawked at Sandra as it spied her standing in the doorway.

            “I know, Sug’, dinner’s almost ready,” Old Woman McGucket said. When the raccoon didn’t let up, her posture sagged. “I’m sorry, it’s just a little longer, please don’t be cross, I’ll make it up to to ya.” The raccoon darted up over piles of trash and disappeared. McGucket turned around to face the sound and shook the tire iron she was using to stir the pot with. “Fine! Leave! I never done felt right about you, nohow!” It was then that she realized she wasn’t alone. “Oh! I’m sorry, I didn’t know I had comp’ny. Come on in, set yerself down!” she cackled and went back to stirring. “Supper’s almost ready!”

            Sandra wanted to say her name. She wanted to reach out and touch her to confirm that this thing before her was real. She wanted to run screaming, but neither words nor action would come to her. She choked out a strangled sort of sob and clapped a hand to her mouth in surprise.

            “What’s that?” McGucket asked and turned around again. Her mouth moved to count the fingers the woman held to her mouth and she took a staggering step backwards. Her head snapped to the laptop Dipper and Abel had given her, the one that had counted down to what she had thought was the end of the world but though the world turned upside down, the end never came. Her eyes glazed over. She dropped the tire iron.

            Sandra managed to take a step toward her, a trembling hand reaching out, eyes searching, but her shock kept her speechless.

 

_Six fingers she has six fingers she has six dang fingers this isn’t this isn’t this can’t be it’s not there’s no way it’s her but six fingers who else could it be can’t be can’t be can’t be long gone gone gone gone the world is coming to an end gravity fell earth became sky the humming in my head what started not long back means he’s back he’s back the beast with just one eye he’s here the end of the world he’s coming yroo xrksvi girzmtov…!_

 

            Panic raced across McGucket’s face and she reached up, grasped a chain hanging down from the ceiling and pulled, hard. In seconds, the shack crumbled into nothing but a pile of junk. Car doors, wood, iron, and garbage rained down on Sandra. She cried out, freed from her trance, but it was too late. McGucket had scampered off through a carefully prepared escape route. By the time Sandra pushed the debris off of herself, she was long gone.

 

.x.

            The rain beat down steadily as Sandra pulled her sister’s muscle car to a stop in front of her home. She sat in the driver’s seat for several moments, mind as grey as the atmosphere and wondered how she could possibly fit in this world that seemed to have totally left her behind. She peered up at the ridiculous signage directing people to the ‘world famous’ Mystery Shack and gripped the steering wheel tightly. Her eyes dropped from the signs to movement on the porch. Through the raindrops on the windshield, she saw a boy standing there, waiting for her to return.

            Sandra crossed the muddy parking lot slowly, already soaked to the bone from her trip into town, and climbed the steps to the porch. She stopped in front of the intense twelve-year old and looked down on him with a dazed but puzzled expression.

            “My sister feels bad that she made you sad,” Abel said plainly, his brown eyes searching hers. “But she thinks that if she tells you that you’ll be more upset so _I’m_ telling you. I know she didn’t mean to make you sad, but she gets stuck on things sometimes, and she’s up in our room and won’t come out. Please go talk to her. I know you’re probably upset right now, so maybe you need some time, but please go soon. She’s really sad and she has no reason to be but she won’t listen to me.”

            Sandra pouted. “This isn’t about her,” she said dismissively.

            “No, it’s about _you,”_ he insisted. “Dipper worships you. Ever since she found your journal you are all she’s thought about all summer, well except Wendell, maybe. Now that you’re real and you’re our aunt, she’s nuts about you. Please, even if you don’t really care, tell her it’s not her fault.”

            The woman dropped the car keys she’d been holding so tightly you could make duplicates from the impressions in her palms and went down on one knee before him. She reached out and touched his cheek. Abel didn’t flinch. “You’re a good brother,” she said. “I’ll speak to her. I promise.” He thanked her, and she tousled his hair as she entered the house.

 

            More than an hour later Dipper flinched as she heard the knock on the door. The footfalls that had approached it were too heavy to be her brother’s and not shuffling enough to be Sandi’s. Should she say ‘come in’ and be faced with her disappointed idol or ‘go away’ and delay the inevitable? What exactly was the inevitable?

            “Dipper?” Sandra asked from the other side of the door. “May I come in?” Her tone was light, friendly, even plaintive.

            “S-sure,” she replied, and The Author of The Journals entered the room. She wasn’t a very tall woman, but to Dipper she seemed to make the whole space seem smaller with her presence. She crossed to Abel’s bed and sat down, hunching forward in an almost child-like manner, clutching one six-fingered hand in the other between her knees. She wore a small, white bandage on her forehead and smelled like soap. Dipper assessed that she’d just had a shower and tried hard not to stare at the bandage, though the mystery of its origin ate away at her.

            “Hey,” Sanda greeted her quietly. “I heard that you think that I’m mad at you.”

            Dipper flushed. “Aren’t you?” she asked, timidly.

            Sandra’s brows arched sympathetically. “Of course not. You know, not everything you say to your loved ones is going to make them happy.”

            “But I was being insensitive. If I had just looked up at your face I could have seen that…”

Sandra shook her head. “Dipper, I’ve kept my feelings locked so deep inside me for the last thirty years, there’s no way you could have known how upset I would be to learn what had become of her. I didn’t even know, or rather, want to admit it to myself. The egg-cup just pushed me over the edge. It was bad timing, is all, and I wasn’t upset with _you_ , I was concerned about _Fiddlefern_.”

            “Oh…” Dipper’s shoulders relaxed. Her idol was not disappointed with her. She practically swooned.

            “And I know from having been a young person once that the advice of your elders can go in one ear and out the other, but, please listen to me. If you think you’ve slighted someone you love, talk it out. Don’t suffer in silence. Don’t let it go. Even if it hurts or seems like it might cause more hurt for the other person. If I had just talked to Sandi… It was only three days. Three days and she left home and I didn’t speak to her for a decade, and then… well, you know the rest.” Sandra’s eyes glistened and she straightened up and let a sigh escape.

            “I-I won’t.”

            “You’re lucky. I don’t think Abel would let you be as much of a bonehead as I was.” Sandra smiled and stood up. “Are we good?”

            Dipper nodded. _‘Is that it?’_ she wondered. _‘What had happened between Sandra and Fiddlefern? Why does she have that bandage? When was…?’_

            “I’d like you to do me a favor,” Sandra said on her way out. “You and your brother had many encounters with her over this summer. Can you report to me about them? She wouldn’t speak to me.” Sandra made a face and touched the bandage. “I think I spooked her. She ran off and pulled some sort of emergency escape mechanism and I got clobbered with scrap metal. If you have any more information about what’s she’s like or what’s happened to her, I could really use it.”

            Dipper jumped up from her bed and beamed at her. “Of course! Would you like a verbal or written report?”

            Sandra blinked at her for a moment then laughed. “How about verbal. We can chat after lunch.”

            Dipper thought that perhaps her heart might just explode. “Sure!” She grabbed some of her notebooks and followed her great aunt down to the kitchen where the four Pines had lunch together.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> An Interlude - flash back to 1985 and look in on one of the dimensions Sandra visited

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was something I hadn’t finished as the main story was chugging along and wasn’t sure I ever would. Then when I did, the right place to put it in had passed, so I’m putting it in now. Consider it less like an afterthought and more like a bonus! (please?) - aks

**Interlude**

 

_This was something I hadn’t finished as the main story was chugging along and wasn’t sure I ever would. Then when I did, the right place to put it in had passed, so I’m putting it in now.  Consider it less like an afterthought and more like a bonus! (please?) - aks_

 

**October 10th, 1985.**

            Stan strolled down Gopher Road, hands in the pockets of a suede shearling coat formerly belonging to his now three-years-lost brother. He admired the fallen leaves, golden and brown in the slanting light of early morning and breathed in the crisp fall air. A few mornings had already brought a little frost to the valley and it lingered in shaded spots. He balled his hands tighter against the chill, but his pace and the coat he wore were enough to keep his core plenty warm.

            It was a really nice coat. For the first year or so, he hadn’t wanted to so much as touch Stanford’s things, but necessity dictated otherwise. The coat was one of the things he really did actually need, so he didn’t feel too guilty for wearing it. Though, the first time he put it on…

            Stan shuddered and took a deep breath of the cool, leafy air. The coat no longer bore his brother’s scent, but even the mere memory of it made his eyes blink back the start of tears. “Come on, Stan. Keep it together. Can’t keep havin’ a friggin’ break down every damn day.”

            It was getting better, but even without the scent of the man on his things, the house had its own smell that would in Stan’s mind forever be uniquely Stanford’s and not his own: the musky scent of pine boards and wood smoke mingled with dust. Stan grimaced as wood smoke made him remember that he’d have to split some more logs for the stove in the coming week if he didn’t want to run out, like he had last year.

            He admired the trees around him as he walked. Aspens and Birch he could identify, but he still didn’t know what kind of pine tree was what. He chuckled a little at the irony of a man named Pines not knowing his Lodgepole from his Ponderosa. At least he’d remembered the names from the book he read—Trees of the Pacific Northwest. He’d read dozens of books from his brother’s collection in the last three years. There wasn’t much else to do and TV service was as good as useless this far out in the sticks.

            While trying to remember which pine tree had two needles and which had three Stan heard a rustling in the brush to his left. His brain immediately leapt to wild conclusions—a condition of having to watch his back for so many years on the road—but just as quickly dismissed the notion that a bookie’s tough was sneaking up on him to stab and mug him (it did happen once). He was in Gravity Falls, and he was Stanford Pines—reclusive scientist and crackpot (all crackpot in the last three years, of course). No one was going to shiv Stanford Pines along the unpaved road to his sylvan cottage. But whatever was in the brush was larger than a squirrel or a bird and it was just on the other side of a slight rise in the terrain. Stan slowed his pace and tried not to make a sound as he set his feet down. _‘Probably a deer,’_ he thought. _‘Or a moose, maybe. Do we have mooses? Or is it mice? No. Moose. No S. That’s right. Sounds weird, though. Ooh, if I can get two moose taxidermy I can make a display and label it mice!’_ The scuffling sound stopped and so did Stan and a few breathless moments passed in silence before he shrugged, and with the happy thought that he had a new exhibit idea for the Mystery Shack, he took one step to continue on his way when he heard a human voice. “Ok, that was a person,” he whispered, removed his hands from his pockets and balled them into fists. There was a series of snapping sounds like something crashing through branches and an agonized cry. He knew it well. Someone was hurt. Stan left the road and dashed through the trees.

            In a small gully, perhaps ten feet from the top of a rise, a woman lay motionless, crumpled in a heap. She wore jeans and running shoes and a plaid flannel shirt. She clutched a good-sized satchel close to her chest. Fanned out in an arc around her, her long, brown hair was tangled and had twigs in it. If he hadn’t just heard her moving, he would have sworn she’d been lying there for hours. Stan slid down the side of the rise, shouting at her, hoping to rouse her, but also to scare off anyone who might have put her in this situation. “Hey! You ok?” he called and pushed the hair back from her face. She winced, but did not otherwise respond. The blue flannel she wore was tattered and filthy and Stan now saw, was partially soaked in blood. Her jeans were torn in a few places and both fresh and old wounds shown through. “Jumped up christ what happened to you…” He slapped her face, trying to wake her. “I prob’ly shouldn’t move you, I read that somewhere. Might have a broken neck or somethin’, but… I…” he didn’t finish the thought as something unusual caught his eye. She clutched the canvas satchel she wore over one shoulder to her chest with six-fingered hands.

Without another word Stan gently scooped her up into his arms, stumbled around the rise through the bushes to the road and marched as fast as he could without jostling or dropping her back to the Mystery Shack.

 

            When he first saw the woman lying on the ground, covered in blood and dirt, his instinct was to protect her, save her, keep her alive. It was not a misplaced notion for any kind soul to think to do for a person in need, but once Stan saw her hands, there was no question that he would do anything to help her.

            Getting her patched up was both difficult and terrifying. Just taking the clothes off of a woman was, for the lonely thirty-something, incredibly embarrassing. He was eternally grateful that she remained unconscious through the entire process. Her wounds were superficial for the most part: bruises, cuts, but a few lacerations required some inventive thinking. His years on the run and experience as a boxer proved useful as he knew that crazy glue worked perfectly well in lieu of stitches. When he’d finished cleaning, treating, and bandaging (cutting wound-sized squares of folded paper towel and adhering them with masking tape, having nothing larger than a band-aid in the house) he found her one of Stanford’s shirts (again, only because it was really necessary) and tried to make her as comfortable as he could. She must have had a few bruised ribs as her breathing was labored that first day, but slowly, she seemed to recover.

            Stan was not a patient man. He watched the six-fingered woman with the brown hair, round nose, and slight dimple in her chin, and wondered. Was she just some random woman who happened to have a few features in common with his lost brother? Or was she some weird female version of him? Or was she actually him and he’d been changed into a woman?! This last thought played in his mind for the better half of a day, sometimes exciting him, sometimes horrifying him. It would be great to have him back, but… Stan shook his head. “Ya know, I’ve been really good,” he said aloud. She didn’t flinch so he decided she was still unconscious. “Really, _really_ good. I find a random woman in the woods and I fix her up and see her naked and I don’t do anything funny and I been sittin’ here trying to figure stuff out and you can’t tell me squat because you’re still out cold so guess what?” He paused again. “I’m gonna go through your stuff!” No response from the woman in the bed. “Great!”

Stan pulled her bag into his lap and before he dove in, noted its condition. It was just a plain canvas bag, probably army surplus from some Soviet Block country by the look of the weird writing stenciled on the front of it. He undid the buckles and loosened the drawstring. There wasn’t much inside: an olive green shirt, dirty; a pair of binoculars, cracked; a couple of pens, chewed-on; what was probably a hard-tack ration, half-eaten; a sort of slick-looking, shiny, all-black watch-type device with a hemispherical ‘face’; and a notebook. Stan contemplated the watch-thing, decided it was some sort of ugly jewelry, and stuffed it back in the bag. The only thing he found interesting was the notebook.

            The cover was normal, light cardboard and bound in the usual fashion with string. The pages were lined, just as you’d imagine they should be. There were no markings on the covers, but the pages were filled with glyphs. “Oh no...” Stanley breathed. The shapes of his brother’s personal cipher were familiar enough to him by now he could read most of them without the key. “No news today either,” he read. “Something something came. Going south. Going to try… something… again to get reading.” He flipped pages. “Day thirty-three. So hungry. Day thirty-four. Found water, feeling better. Day thirty-five. Dogs like wolves. Longer teeth. Must have my scent,” he read the last entry and closed the notebook.

 

            On the third day, she woke up.

Stan was dozing at her bedside when he heard her whimper in pain, having tried to move. “Whoa, take it easy,” he said quietly and raised his hands in a placating gesture. Her eyes darted around the room and back to his face several times, squinting and frightened in the manner of an animal trapped in a cage. After three days of wondering and worrying about her, his stomach flipped with concern. He chose his words carefully. “I’m not gonna hurt ya. You’re in my house. You’re safe.”

            She stared at his raised hands and slowly relaxed her tense posture, her head resting back against the pillow. She kept her lips pressed tightly together and her eyes on him, but said nothing.

            “You thirsty?”

            She nodded.

            “I’m gonna get you some water. Stay put,” he ordered and her eyes flashed indignantly and her brows came together. “ _Please_ , stay put. I patched you up with paper towels, masking tape, and crazy glue. You move too much it’ll come undone.” He offered her a weak, brief smile but her expression barely softened enough to be noticed. “Be right back.” Stan jogged out of the room and practically ran to the kitchen and tore it apart looking for a vessel. In a few minutes he returned, breathless, with a light blue plastic pitcher of water and a beat-up plastic tumbler with the Seattle Mariners’ logo on it. She seemed less jumpy than before, so he gave her a bit more smile. She even allowed him to help her sit up a bit so that she could drink. When she’d downed two big cups full her stomach grumbled audibly, causing Stan to chuckle. The woman was not amused. He put his left hand behind his head and stuck out his right.

            “Well, we’re gettin’ off to a great start, aren’t we? I’m Stan,” he said and let his hand hang in the air, waiting patiently for her to take it.

            Cautiously, she pulled her right hand out from under the covers and glanced from it to his eyes. He didn’t break eye-contact as she shook it. “I’m Sandra,” she said quietly.

            “ _Sandra,_ ” Stan repeated. His eyes flashed with deep sadness. _Not Stanford._ He gave their shake a three pumps before releasing her.

            Sandra narrowed her eyes at him. “Stan? May I ask a question?”

            “Sure, shoot.”

            “Why am I not wearing any pants?”

            The young man pursed his lips tightly. For the last three days he’d been on pins and needles, not getting much sleep and hoping against hope that his ministrations would be successful—that she’d pull through and he’d get some answers. Knowing that she was alright, and giddy with relief, Stan lost it. He dissolved into a fit of giggles and wiped a happy tear from his eye. “Oh man, I’m sorry. I just… that was _not_ what I was expecting you to ask!” When he recovered he explained the state he’d found her in, that her clothes were shredded and bloody, and it was hard enough getting a new shirt on her so he just doubled up on blankets and left it at that. Sandra didn’t reply, but seemed satisfied with the answer. She examined the men’s baseball-style shirt with the white body and black sleeves he’d given her to wear and her hands moved under the covers to feel the tape-and-towel bandages that covered her wounds. He’d used the crazy glue, he said, on the long wound on her side because it wouldn’t stop bleeding.

            Sandra grimaced but nodded. “Stan,” she said, squinting and looking around her. “You said I was in _your_ house?”

            “Yeah,” he said, staring intensely, almost unblinking, at her.

            She let a soft sigh escape, folded her unusual hands in her lap and looked down at them. “It’s your brother’s house, isn’t it?”

            “Yeah.”

            “I assume that he’s gone?”

            The pitch of his voice increased. “Yeah…”

            Sandra turned her head and narrowed her eyes. “I lost my glasses again,” she said. “But, you do kind of look like Dad from here.”

            Stan slapped a hand to his mouth to stifle a sob. “Don’t say that!” he mumbled, and nearly fell out of his chair as he leapt up and hastily exited the room. He wasn’t sure where he was going at first, just anywhere away from her soft, brown eyes. His brother’s soft, brown eyes. Using the bathroom as a haven for a moment he ran the tap and splashed a little cold water on his face. The man in the mirror appeared weary and sad. He frowned, toweled off and took a bottle of Tylenol out of the medicine cabinet.

 

            When he returned, Sandra had made herself a little more comfortable. She peered out the window to her right at the autumn foliage with a blank, lost expression.

            “Here,” Stan said and tossed her the bottle of aspirin. “I didn’t give you anything yet.”

            She thanked him and took a few of the pain killers.

            “An’ I figure maybe this might be handy.” Stan sat down next to her again and handed her something she couldn’t make out until she had it in her hands. “Prob’ly too big, but, might work.”

            Sandra shuddered as she took Stanford Pines’ glasses in her hand. They were much too large but nearly the same prescription, so when she looked at Stan again her eyes widened. “On closer inspection, you don’t look all that much like him. And not really like Sherman, either.”

            “You got a brother Shermy, too? So, we’re really brother and sister, huh?”

            “Technically, yes.”

            Stan relaxed and crossed an ankle over his knee. “I thought for a while you might’a been Stanford turned into a girl by some sort of gender-swap ray!”

            “ _Stanford,_ ” she repeated.

            “What’s _your_ twin’s name?”

            “Sandi.”

            “Ha! So dad hated you guys, too, huh?” At last, he got a chuckle out of her. Stan grinned, pleased with the result. “Hey, how much you wanna bet Stanford and Sandi are having this exact same conversation right now somewhere out there?”

            Sandra raised a brow. “It’s highly unlikely.”

            This deflated him. “How you figure?”

            “Take the shape of these glasses, for example. Mine were round.”

            “So?”

            “So, there are probably quite a few differences between Stanford and I that might ripple out enough to give us different paths. I can assume that since you are here, that he called you to his home to get rid of his first journal.” Stan nodded. “And you had a disagreement,” she said. Another nod. “And he... fell in.”

            Stan found it hard to speak through his clenched teeth. “Sounds the same to me.”

            “Hm. Where were you when he called you?”

            “New Mexico.”

            “Sandi was in Las Vegas. See? Our paths are not exactly the same.”

            “So what?!”

 _“So,_ I don’t think that your brother is talking to my sister right now. He could be anywhere, or even in the same dimension he fell into three years ago. The only reason I’ve changed places is because the first world I came to had invented a device for detecting gravitic anomalies which I hacked into an inter-dimensional key.”

            Stan stomped his foot back down on the floor and leaned in toward her. “That watch thing can take you to another dimension?!”

            Sandra made a sheepish face. “Yes and no...wait, you went through my bag?”

            “You were out for _three days_ ,” he said, folding his arms as if that were enough of an excuse for his invasion of her privacy. He frowned deeply. “If you have a gizmo that takes you from one dimension to another, why not go home?”

            “If only it worked that way,” she said softly and looked out the window again. “After arriving in a given dimension it can take a few days, weeks, or even months to locate the next viable jump coordinates, and then it takes you to a random world—good or bad.”

            Stan shifted his weight in his seat. “Last one was bad, huh?” he asked, a bit sheepish.

            “Yeah, not great. Large, carnivorous canids. No humans. About five weeks until the thing reset.” Sandra asked him to give her the bag and fished out the bracelet. When she touched it, the black ‘face’ glowed red with strange characters that pulsed a few times, then faded. “The first world I fell into was made of mostly islands and the locals used something they called a ‘rougu po-ozu’—a sort of compass that measures shifting ley-lines and subtle movements of the magnetosphere to determine the location of extremely distant neighboring islands. A normal compass did not function properly in their world. After a length of time that was specific for each island, the log-pose would reset and point to the next island but because of the shifting nature of the world’s magnetism, this could point to one island this week for one person, and another next week for the next.”

            A small smile Stan recognized as the same as his brother’s when he was on a roll tugged at Sandra’s lips. It delighted him, so even though the conversation was going completely over his head he decided to smile and nod.

            “I’m losing you, aren’t I? Sandi would have huffed at me by now.”

            “No, no! Well, yes, but…”

            “It’s ok. In layman’s terms, I took their log-pose and jury-rigged it into a inter-dimensional key. It’s not optimal, but it’ll do. So far I have not been successful in storing those coordinates in any usable fashion, so I can’t return to a place once I leave it. There was such a device in their word they called an ‘e-taa-naru po-zu’ that had the memory of one particular island locked into it, but I was not able to engineer it to remember a dimensional signature, and even if I could, I don’t know the signature of my home world. I just hope that as long as I keep moving forward, perhaps one day I’ll stumble upon home.”

            “Or you can use the portal in my basement to get my brother back and swap places with him!”

Sandra’s face darkened and she curtly replied “Absolutely not.”

            Stan’s posture changed instantly and glared at her. “What?!”

            “Ab-so-lutely not! Did Stanford not tell you how dangerous that thing is? Its activation causes what equate to eddies—little whorls of interdimensional residue that over time add up. With just one test and one activation there’s already enough down there to cause a shift in reality that could majorly damage this world should it be exploited.”

            “I don’t care,” Stan said flatly and folded his arms.

            “Ok,” she sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose. “Maybe I’m not being clear. Stan, each time it opens, more residue accumulates which might eventually form a rift in spacetime that could bring the _universe_ to an _end!”_

            “It _might_ come to an end? That’s a chance I’m willing to take.”

            The scientist looked at him as if his head were on fire. “You’re being irrational, Stan!”  
            He opened his mouth to tell her how much like his brother she sounded but the words stuck in his throat. She really was so much like him. He deflated, pouted and looked away. “Do you love your sister?” he asked.

            Sandra’s mouth hung open. “I…” Her brows arched and she turned to face the window so fast that the ill-fitting glasses nearly flew off her face. “O-of course. She’s my sister.”

            “No. Do you _love_ her? Would you do anything to get her back? Would you work every day to figure out a way to make it happen? Would you _give your life_ for her? I did. I threw my identity away so I can stay here and bash my head into that damned machine every night. I been learnin’ quantum physics, and if your Sandi’s anything like me, you know how crazy hard that is for me. But I’m doin’ it, because I’m not gonna give up. I’m gonna make good. I’m gonna get him back.”

            A long silence passed and just as Stan stood to let her brood on her own, Sandra turned back and looked down at her hands folded in her lap.

            “That sentiment alone proves how different we truly are. I’m sure that once she realized I was gone, Sandi got back in her car drove back to Vegas as fast as she could.”

            “That can’t be true…”

            “Why not?” Sandra scoffed. “We hadn’t spoken in a decade after I ‘ruined her life’.”

            Stan sat back down in his chair with a heavy thud. “Wait, _you_ ruined…?”

            Sandra blinked at him. “What are you asking me…?”

            “Sandi’s the one pissed off at you?”

            “Well, yes, I ruined her chance for marriage.”

            _“Marriage…?”_ Stan repeated. “Wait, what? What about the science fair?!”

            “What about the…” Sandra paled. “Sandi broke my perpetual motion machine. We fixed it.”

            Stan’s jaw hung open for a beat. “You…fixed…it?”

            Sandra clutched the comforter tightly. “You didn’t?”

            “No.” His face was ashen.

            “And West Coast Tech…?”

            “He didn’t get in.” Stan shook his head and a wave of nausea washed over him. His voice came out at a near whisper. “Dad found out what I did—threw me out. I didn’t speak to Stanford for ten years.”

            Sandra trembled and stared at her sister’s male counterpart. “I caught Carl McCorkle with another girl. Broke them up. She left home and we didn’t speak for ten years…”

            “Carl… I had a _Carla_ McCorkle… until I caught her with another guy.”

            Sandra gasped. “You didn’t marry her?”

            “No…” Stan’s eyes glistened with tears. “So, you went to West Coast Tech? If I had just went and got Ford, we coulda fixed the thing and everything woulda been fine…?!”

            She shook her head. “I don’t think so.”

            “But…!”

            “No,” she shook her head slowly. “It sounds to me that we were destined to be broken apart. You in your way, and us in ours. It’s terrible and stupid, but there must be a reason…”

            “Are you kiddin’ me?!”

            She looked on him with sympathy. “Would you rather think it’s something you could have done something about? Stan, I don’t believe in God, but I do believe in inertia. There are some things once set in motion that cannot be stopped. I’ve learned to accept that the places I travel to are ones that I was somehow meant to go, and to _keep going.”_ She took a deep breath. “I suppose I should practice what I preach. Ok, I’ll help you, Stan.”

            “Y… you will?!”

            She nodded. “If we can keep the energy output, aperture, and duration to a minimum, the damage will be minimal and containable. Be forewarned, though. Stanford will be very upset with you.”

            Stan chuckled and wiped his eyes. “Sister, that’s par for the course.”

 

.x.

            “First thing we need to do is find Stanford’s other journals,” Sandra stated the next morning at breakfast. Stan lavished pancakes, eggs, bacon, and juice on his guest and watched her every move. Even her posture, the way she held her hands behind her back, the crook of her smile were all so familiar to him it made his heart twist. Stan questioned why Sandra would need instructions at all, being that she had made an identical device and Sandra gave him a funny look explaining “I wrote them down in my journals so that I wouldn't _have_ to remember!”

            Finding Stanford’s second and third journals was an easy feat to accomplish with someone who had hidden her own set in the exact same places. The one marked with a ‘2’ had been stashed in a filing cabinet in the Gravity Falls museum in a folder labeled “favorite prime numbers of the town’s first inhabitants”. Stan laughed a bit too loudly when they found it, forcing them to beat a hasty retreat. The third journal was also where Sandra had hidden hers, not far from the house in its subterranean tomb.

            Securing the fuel needed was the next challenge. Sandra took Stan to the mound in the middle of the valley, pointed out the strange shape of the cliffs and asked him if he believed in aliens. Stan scoffed, said no, and Sandra grinned to split her face as she revealed just what they were standing on. It was tough hauling the fuel cells from the derelict spaceship, but only six of the large, egg-like pods were needed for a one-time charge of the portal.

 

            In less than twenty-four hours, Sandra and Stan stood in the control room and initiated the startup sequence. She dusted off her hands and put them on her hips. “Well, that’s the last check,” she said and closed the covers of Stanford’s three journals. “We’re at twenty-five percent throttle, just enough to open the gateway for three minutes. Ready?”

            Stan nodded and followed her into the portal room. His hairs stood on end as he watched the opening glow, spin, and hum. The image of his brother being pulled through, arms and legs flailing, screaming his name, flashed through his mind and he winced. His other-world sister turned and faced the portal. Stan took a few steps forward and lifted a shaking hand, but the words to express his dread would not come. The timer counted down to zero and the aperture opened. “Stay behind the line!” Sandra barked at Stan as he got a little too close.

            He nodded, snapped a carabiner to her belt, and gave her a hug that took her by surprise. “Thank you,” Stan said. “Even though you’ve told me a hundred times not to get my hopes up, even if this doesn’t work, thank you for trying.”

            Sandra was too nervous to speak, so simply nodded and returned the hug, squeezing him tightly. She picked up her bag (crammed with supplies and snacks courtesy of Stan), stepped over the line and pushed off into the air. Her pulse raced and she closed her eyes, hoping he couldn’t see the look of terror on her face as she passed through the opening.

            When she felt gravity pull her back down to earth, Sandra opened her eyes. The man standing before her was dressed in a black trenchcoat and had a rifle-style weapon leveled at her head. “Stanford?” she asked and he lowered it, revealing a face identical to Stan’s save the cleft chin and glasses. “I’m Sandra Pines,” she said and stuck out one of her hands.

            His mouth dropped open and for a moment he was dumbstruck. “Fascinating…” he whispered. His eyes flicked from her face and his discarded pair of glasses practically hanging off of her nose then down to the six fingers of her outstretched hand.

            Sandra couldn’t help but grin at her double and though her curiosity burned hot, there was no time to lose. “Is this world hospitable?” she asked. “Is it _safe?”_

            A little confused by the question he answered to the affirmative. The landscape around them was rather plain, but pretty: rolling hills, grassy fields, a stream leading to a pond at the edge of a wooded copse, blue sky, and warm, sweet air. “Good,” she said and unclipped the carabiner and beckoned to him. “Hurry! Your Stanley is waiting for you, as are my notes about the worlds I’ve travelled.” At the mention of his brother’s name, Stanford Pines gasped and repeated it. He took the carabiner, clipped it to his utility belt, and wrapped the line around his arm several times. “I only wish you could have left me your notes and that my own sister was waiting for me here.”

            Stanford realized she meant to swap places with him and gaped at her. “But…!”

            Sandra pursed her lips and shrugged. “Onward!” she said, flashing him a sad smile. The portal pulsed, losing its stability. “Go! Hurry!” she shouted and gave the line three quick tugs—the signal to Stanley on the other side to start pulling and Stanford jerked forward, his feet leaving the ground. “Wait!” he cried but she jogged away from him.

            “Your world is yours. I’ve still got to find mine,” she called to him.

            “But I have so many questions!”

            “Ask Stan! And tell him I said thank you!”

            Stanford called out his thanks to his female double as he disappeared into the portal. Sandra watched until he and the ethereal aperture vanished, smiled, and fell to her knees as the adrenaline surge wore off. The young woman wept for several minutes, then pushed her disappointment down deep under layers and layers of pain, stood up and checked the log-pose. Under her touch its face resolved into a red, pulsing light, searching for a path to the next world.

 

.x.

            Stan gawked at the portal as he saw Sandra’s feet disappear and kept tension on the line that tethered her to his world. He could feel her every move, when she set her feet back down on the ground, when she took a few steps forward. _‘Good,’_ he thought. _‘She’s not running.’_ Time seemed to slow to a crawl, the line moved only slightly then suddenly the signal--three quick tugs. Stan pulled with all his might and in moments a six-fingered hand emerged, followed by the rest of his brother who tucked and rolled and tumbled gracefully from the opening onto the floor of the lab.

            He was almost knocked over by his twin as Stan collided with him and hugged him so tightly he could barely breathe. Stan’s overjoyed smile fell as the portal closed and he went still. “Stanford,” he breathed, releasing him and staring in disbelief at the inverted triangle. “What about Sandra? She ok?!”

            Stanford blinked at him, a little disjointed. “She said to say ‘thank you.’”

            Stan dropped his head onto his brother’s shoulder and as all of the stress and tension of the last few days broke through his defenses, he sobbed heavily. Stanford Pines pulled his brother close and shushed him, repeating the sentiment quietly into his ear. “Thank you. Thank you.”

 

_End Interlude_


	10. Chapter 10

            The rain that darkened both the sky and the mood the previous day had moved on by morning. Abel and Dipper were off to visit with their friend PJ (Preston Elliott Northwest Jr. to his enemies), giving Sandra a respite from Dipper’s constant attention. She didn’t mind so much, really, but it was a little overwhelming for someone who had been alone for so long.

            The information the children gave her about Fiddlefern was disturbing yet illuminating, and for that she thanked them profusely. Sandi was noticeably quiet while the kids recounted their adventures involving Old Woman McGucket, muttering occasionally, ‘you did _what?’_ or ‘wow, I’m glad I’m just an aunt.’ It seemed that the effects of multiple exposures to the Blind Eye Ray had done severe damage to the once brilliant woman’s mind, but had perhaps not utterly erased everything. She was starting to remember things, they said. But she didn’t remember who her old boss was.

            Sandra did her best to keep from showing her shock. She thought that perhaps she’d hidden it from the children, but her sister made a small sound, a light gasp that made her believe that she had caught it, though Sandi didn’t said a word to her afterwards.

            There was a certain peace that knowing she’d been forgotten brought to Sandra. Perhaps the pain of betrayal that Fiddlefern had felt was also gone and she was blissfully ignorant of it. But if so, why had she fled from her? Fiddlefern had recognized her by her hands, she was certain of it.

            These thoughts cycled through her mind again as Sandra walked out onto the porch of the Mystery Shack that afternoon. A steady, sweeping breeze blew the pine trees around her home, the branches swishing like waves on a beach somewhere deep in her memory. Sandra closed her eyes and took a cleansing breath. Perhaps she could learn to be comfortable again. She had her sister back, and now she had Dipper and Abel and soon their father Alex and his wife, too. Things would be ok. If they could prevent the end of the world in one piece, maybe.

            Out of the corner of her eye, Sandra spied movement from the edge of the clearing a hundred yards away and glanced up, expecting to see a deer or even a gnome, but what she saw had her on her feet in an instant. A human figure stumbled out from the tree line, encumbered by a makeshift crutch. Her hair was wild and grey and she moved forward slowly, her gaze on the ground before her. Sandra stepped off the porch and approached her cautiously. She whispered then shouted her name. The woman stopped and looked up, terrified, not quite seeing her. She turned abruptly and headed back into the woods and Sandra sprinted toward her. “Fiddlefern!” she screamed. When she reached her, Old Woman McGucket was trembling all over. Her eyes were unfocused and darted around. Her right arm, in an ancient-looking plaster cast, spasmed randomly. “Fiddsy! Fiddsy, it’s me! It’s ok! Fiddsy!” she cried and held her face in her hands, but the woman’s eyes unfocused and rolled back as she went limp. Sandra caught her as she fell and easily scooped the smaller, and now, very much lighter woman up into her arms and plodded as fast as she could back toward the house, screaming for her sister. Sandi charged out to help her take Fiddlefern to the emergency room.

 

            Fiddlefern could not have weighed more than ninety pounds and at five feet four inches tall, that was too little for a sixty year old woman. Sandra held her tiny, shaking frame in the back of Sandi’s car as her sister sped through town toward the hospital. Fiddlefern smelled to high heaven of body odor, human waste, and the forest. Her hair was pale grey, tangled and matted. A few of her teeth were missing. Her fingernails were cracked and encrusted with filth. What was left of her clothes could have gotten up and walked off without her, and that cast—how long had she worn it? The muscle of her upper arm was atrophied; Sandra could only imagine the horrors beneath it as she clutched her former lover until they arrived at the ER.

 

.x.

            “Why won’t they let me in!” Sandra shouted.

            “I’m sorry ma’am, but only relatives and spouses can go in—HIPAA,” the receptionist said with a shrug.

            Sandra wanted to punch something but decided that it wouldn’t get her anywhere nearer to her goal, and fortunately, Sandi was there to restrain her. “Come on, Sand. She’ll be ok. I’ll call her daughter. You sit tight,” she said and gently pushed her into one of the cushy chairs in the waiting room. Sandi wandered off to find a payphone, promising to come back as soon as she could. Sandra put her face in her hands and tried to calm her breath fairly successfully. Soon, Sandi returned. She had to leave a message for Tatom McGucket, but tried to reassure Sandra that she’d be here soon. She flopped down in the chair next to her, put her hands behind her head, glanced over at the hunched and anxious form of her sister then stared out into the waiting room.

 

            Three hours passed and the Pines twins grew more and more frustrated with the state of modern medicine. Sandra tried again to beg the receptionist to let her know if Fiddlefern was alright, but the hospital would tell them nothing, even though they had been the ones who brought her in.

            Despondent, she returned to her seat and folded her arms. Sandi had dozed off, but woke when she was jostled by the chair moving. “Ya know,” she said groggily, rubbing a knuckle into her eye, “back when I was in Vegas, I knew this one guy. His _boyfriend_ was in a car accident and they wouldn’t let him in and the poor bastard died alone.” She grimaced and rubbed the back of the knuckle against her skirt. “They’re workin’ on that now. Won’t be long before it won’t matter if you’re married to a guy or a gal—all married people will have the same rights.”

            “Dee…” Sandra gasped. “You _know?_ ”

            “I guessed. Makes sense.”

            “And you’re not… grossed out?”

            She gave her a perplexed look. “You ain’t gonna make me watch, are ya? No! I’m not grossed out. Damnit, Sand, you’re my sister and that’s that.” She smiled and put her hand on her sister’s shoulder. “I’m actually kinda impressed that you found someone to love. I was kinda worried about that with you.” Sandra covered her hand and patted it, gratefully. Her sister craned her neck and cocked an ear toward the doors to the ER. “And if these idiots are gonna keep you from the gal you love, I’m gonna do somethin’ about it.” She leaned close and whispered that she was pretty sure she just heard them say something about having taken Fiddlefern up to a room.

            “Come on,” she ordered, standing. “Time to dust off some of the old skills. I’m gettin’ you in there, _Dr. Pines._ ”

            “Doctor…?” Sandra asked dreamily. “Sandi, this sounds highly illegal.”

            “Yep! Come on!”

 

            The easiest way to do something illegal is to present yourself as if you are perfectly in the right. Act like a criminal—be noticed as a criminal, Sandi instructed her sister. They walked down the hall, took an elevator, ducked into a supply closet, suited Sandra up with a coat and a clipboard and the scene was set. Sandi followed her, coughing occasionally for effect as they searched for Fiddlefern’s room. When they found it, Sandi motioned that she would keep watch and let her dip in alone.

 

            Sandra choked back a sob as she took in what she saw. The old woman looked so small and helpless in the boxy, white hospital bed. An IV ran to her left arm and the cast had been removed from her right, but it sported fresh bandages. They had cut her matted hair and must have bathed her, somehow. Her skin was not as pink as it should be and the heart monitor to her right displayed a rapid heartbeat. An oxygen tube was taped to her nose. With shaking hands, Sandra took the chart from the foot of the bed and read it quickly. _Hypothermia, malnutrition, exhaustion, dehydration, sepsis._ The last term took Sandra’s breath away, and she scrambled to see what remediation they had taken. It all checked out. They were doing their best with a homeless woman who was on the verge of death.

            Sandra pulled the lone chair in the room close to the bedside and put her hand carefully over Fiddlefern’s left, minding the IV needle taped to it. “Fiddsy, you can do it. You have to. Tatom’s coming soon, you’ve got to hang in there,” She stroked her hair and tried not to cry. “Please, please hang in there.” Neither the woman nor the monitors she was attached to showed any signs that she acknowledged her presence.

            Outside the door, a nurse saw Sandi Pines standing guard and grew suspicious so Sandi did the first thing that came to her mind. “Oh! I can’t breathe!” she shouted, alerting her twin. The nurse rushed to assist her and Sandra slipped out of the room unnoticed. When she saw that Sandra was clear, Sandi broke free of the nurse. “Ah! It’s a miracle! You gals are top notch!” Sandi chimed, suddenly ‘recovering’ and hurrying off after Sandra down the stairs.

 

            Every day, Sandra stopped at the hospital to ask if Fiddlefern had been moved to a room and if visitors were allowed, and for three agonizing days she was turned away.

            “Why don’tcha just go see Tatom? She’d be able to tell ya how she’s doin’.” Sandi wondered, becoming exasperated by her sister’s constant pacing.

            “I don’t want to get her worked up. She may not even remember me! If mom had been sick and some woman came up to you and said she was her _wife_ , would _you_ be fine with it?”

            Sandi made a face. “Yikes. Ok, you’re right,” she cursed under her breath. “What’s another day of wearin’ down the floorboards?”

 

.x.

            On the third day, promptly at ten in the morning, Sandra appeared at the registration desk yet again. The receptionist was a nice young man who smiled wide when he saw her. He gave her a nod before she opened her mouth and said “Room 118. She’s awake.”

            Sandra walked briskly down the hall and slowed just before room 118. She took a deep breath, pushed the handle down and entered. The small old woman was sitting up, looking off to her right, her gaze softly focused on the clouds and the branches of a large oak tree just outside her window. Sandra’s heart soared with relief. She cleared her throat and said “knock-knock?”

            The placid expression on Old Woman McGucket’s face fell and her head snapped to the sound. She squinted at her visitor and her eyes searched her for a moment, darting up and down, taking in her grey hair, her long Nantucket-red skirt, and yellow-and-white striped long-sleeved polo shirt, but was unable to focus without her glasses. “Y-yer not the doc, are ye?”

            “No. I’m not,” Sandra said, almost at a whisper.

            “Oh.”

            “Do you need one?”

            “No… no I don’t think so.”

            “Can I sit?”

            “Suit yerself.”

            Sandra crossed to the chair at her bedside and seated herself, her body moving as if through molasses. “You look better,” she said, trying to remain calm and upbeat despite the dread she felt descending on her with every vague reply the woman gave her.

            “I do?”

            “Oh, yes.”

            She reached up and touched the short ends of her white hair with a trembling left hand. The IV lines moved with it. “Mah hair’s all chopped,” she said softly. “An’ they took away mah cast. Guess I don’t need it no more.”

            “Sure,” Sandra said trying to ease the conversation along. “You’re not as _grey_ as you were.”

            McGucket raised a brow. “Grey?”

            She nodded. “Your skin’s looking better. You’re looking much _healthier_ , is what I mean.”

            “Oh. I suppose. They got me all loopy on somethin’ or other. Said I gotta stay put,” she said dreamily.

            It relieved Sandra to think that at least part of her stupor could be attributed to medicine and recovery. “Yes, you do. You had sepsis—a terrible infection. You have to sit tight for a while and heal up.”

            McGucket nodded slowly. “Sure. Guess so. Tater says so, so I guess so.” Her brows came together as she struggled with something.

            “You don’t remember how you got here because you weren’t conscious,” Sandra preempted. “ _Not_ because you can’t remember.”

            The old woman’s eyes brightened and the left side of her mouth tugged upwards. “Well, that is a relief.” She looked intently at her visitor and squinted again. “You’re bein’ awful kind to me. Are we acquainted, you and I?” she asked, a bit of the old drawl purring over her tongue.

            Sandra flushed and clenched her fists. She managed a tight smile and fought hard against the desire to pull her into an embrace. “Yes, we are. But it’s been a long time.”

            The old woman’s mouth curved and twitched. “I-I don’t see so good,” she said and tried to lean forward. She winced in pain as she tried to use her right arm for leverage.

            Sandra put her hand on her shoulder and stopped her. “Please, don’t exert yourself!”

            Her eyes dropped to the hand and studied it for a moment. “One… two… three, four, five. _Six?”_ The heart monitor to her right displayed a spike in activity as she raised her eyes to search the face now leaning in, only a foot away. “No. Stop torturin’ me! Leave me be! Yroo xrksvi girzmtov…” Her eyes dilated and opened wide with fright. Sandra jumped as Fiddlefern’s elevated heart rate triggered piercing alarms, further terrifying the old woman who screamed, pushed Sandra and pulled the IV from her arm as she scrambled to get away. In moments a nurse and a tall woman with dirty-blond hair, her bangs practically covering her eyes, rushed into the room.

            “Mom!” Tatom McGucket cried and ran to help the nurse restrain her. She stole a glance at Sandra as she backed out of the room with a look of horror on her face.

 

            Sandra walked down the hall as if asleep. She shook her head and hugged herself. “What were you thinking? She doesn’t _really_ remember, but then she _did…?”_ The words she had said flashed in her mind, the letters rearranged themselves into ‘bill cipher triangle’ and she shuddered. “No matter how hard she tried to forget…Oh, Fiddlefern…”

            “Hey, excuse me, Miss Pines? That is you, isn’t it?” Tatom McGucket called from the other end of the hall. She jogged to catch up with Sandra, taking long strides. “You’re Missy Mystery’s sister, the one who brought mom in, right?”

            Sandra nodded slowly.

            “I’m sorry about Mom. She tends to do that. Freak out, I mean. She didn’t hurt you, did she?”

            “No…” Sandra narrowed her eyes. “Has she been like this long?”

            “As long as I can remember. Did you know her _before?”_ Tatom asked, hopefully.

            “Yes, Tatom, I did.”

            The woman cocked her head to one side. “Do I know you?”

            Sandra folded her arms. “You were very little.”

            “We came here when I was five, I wasn’t _that_ little. I went to kindergarten here. Before I got fostered we lived… in a… in a little house in the woods. An A-frame house.” Her jaw tightened and she stared intently at the floor.

            Sandra relaxed slightly and nodded slowly. Her memory had probably been wiped, but as Dipper and Abel suggested it might, feeding the truth to a person seemed to help restore what was lost. “Yes. It’s now the Mystery Shack,” she offered.

            Tatom looked back up and blinked at her. “Your house?”

            “My house.”

            Tatom’s mouth hung open for a moment before she whispered “Mommy Sandra?”

            Sandra gasped and smiled thinly, nodding her head vigorously, her words trapped in her throat.

 

_It can’t be it can’t be it can’t be that’s long gone long long gone, gone forever. Ruined. What’s gone? Nothing. Missy Mystery doesn’t know what you’re talking about you crazy old coot, she’s real nice though and so familiar and doesn’t throw things at me or treat me poorly but she doesn’t have six fingers she’s so familiar it hurts. It hurts. It hurts. Why? No. Don’t ask why. Never ask why. It is unseen. What is? Nothing. Turn a blind eye. Blind eye blind eye blind eye Society of the Blind Eye everything that hurts is unseen all those unpleasant memories gone gone gone. Everything was fine fine. Who was I? Why does my Tater hate me so? Missy’s kin opened my eyes, opened the blind eyes and now I see. See again. I was so nice looking and my voice didn’t tremble so long long ago when I worked for a visiting researcher. Who? Gone. I quit the project. Why? DO NOT ASK WHY don’t ask why why are you asking why you wanted to unsee and now look what you done. He’s coming. End times are coming. The nightmare will begin. Gravity fell earth became sky. He’s here. The hum is him. The hum in my head is him. He’s here. It can’t be. It can’t be. It’s a trick. He’s tricking you like he tricked her. She’s gone gone but her hand was so warm and it was hers it was it was it was but she’s gone but it was her and her grey hair she didn’t have grey hair it was dark dark and soft Sandra’s hair was so soft…_

 

            Fiddlefern’s eyes flew open and she screamed her name. Moments later Sandra and Tatom sprinted back into the room. The nurses had restrained the patient who was thrashing with what little energy she had left. Tatom ran around to the other side of the bed and tried to calm her.

            When Fiddlefern saw the blurry shape of her former partner appear in the doorway she quieted and stared, squinting at her. “Sandra?” she whispered. Sandra nodded. “ _My_ Sandra…?” She reached out for her with her left arm. Sandra took her hand in her left and touched Fiddlefern’s cheek with her right, wiping her tears with her thumb. “Where have you _been_?”

            Quiet tears rolled down Sandra’s face as she bent over her to kiss her face. “It’s a long story.”

            “Did it open? Last couple months…” Fiddlefern whispered, the hysteria’s exertion taking its toll. “I been feelin’ it. Like I’m a tunin’ fork and he’s a B flat. He’s here. It’s comin’. End times. Sandra…”

            She shushed her and stroked her hair. “I shut it down. Sandi and I did. Nothing’s coming through there ever again.” It wasn’t the complete truth, but it wasn’t a lie. “I missed you so much, Fiddlefern. I’m so sorry. For everything. You were right. This is all my fault. Everything’s going to be ok. I’ll take care of you. You, me, Tatom, Sandi—we’re all gonna be ok.”

            Fiddlefern’s fingers lazily played with the ends of Sandra’s hair and she raised her chin to kiss her lips. “My sweet Sandra… “ she repeated dreamily as a fresh set of sedatives took effect. “Where _have_ you been?”


	11. Chapter 11

            Sandra visited Fiddlefern every day, and every day she grew stronger and slightly more coherent. There were good days and bad days, of course, but always a little bit better, and it gave the poor woman’s daughter and her former partner hope.

 

            One day, Tatom brought up the question of where Fiddlefern would go once she was discharged. Sandra winced remembering the hovel she had occupied in the junkyard and compulsively wrung her hands. Tatom had tried a few times before to wrangle her ornery ma into a proper home, but found that her tiny ranger-station apartment could not peacefully house the two of them. Looking up from her worrying, Sandra whispered that she would gladly take care of Fiddlefern if she’d have her again and Tatom beamed back, thanking her profusely and saying that she’d be just a phone call away and she’d come to visit when she could. It was clearly a load off the young woman’s shoulders—a young woman who had only known her mother to be a mentally disturbed mad scientist. Though it seemed Fiddlefern was on the road to recovery in that aspect as well, Tatom was relieved to have someone who cared so deeply for her mother to rely on.

            Sandra nodded and when she extended her hand to shake Tatom’s, Ranger McGucket pulled her into a brief, but sincere hug.

 

            That evening, Sandra emerged from her lab after many hours of solitude. She poked her head around the corner of the kitchen doorframe. The three other Pines were seated at the table just finishing up a meal of mac and cheese and hot dogs. “Dee, can you give me a hand with something?” she asked,

            “Ooh! I can help!” Dipper chimed and bolted out of her seat.

Sandra pouted. “No, I’m sorry, Dipper. This is something only Sandi can help with. Thank you, though.”

            The girl slowly sat back down. “Oh, ok…” she muttered.

            “It’s probably not as cool as you think, kiddo.” Sandi patted her head.

            Sandra chuckled, a bit embarrassed. “It’s of a _personal_ nature, not a scientific one.”

            This caught her sister’s interest and she quickly followed her out of the room, barking at the kids to clean everything up. They groaned in reply but did as they were told.

            Once they were out of hearing range, Sandra stopped and gave Sandi the once-over, taking in her shorts, tank-top and slippers. “You might want to get dressed,” she suggested, whispering. “I need help getting something out of the bunker and it’s probably not exactly warm or clean down there.”

            Sandi scoffed. “My furnace is goin’ like friggin crazy these days, I’ll be fine.”

            “Furnace?” Sandra asked, blinking at her. “Oh, you have hot flashes, really?”

            “You _don’t?!”_ Sandi cried.

            She mulled this question over. “I suppose I did for a time, but not anymore.”

            “Cheap!” Sandi barked. “That is _no fair!”_ Her sister laughed a little, but not as much as Sandi would have hoped. “So, whatcha need from the bunker?”

            “A box or two of things. It’s not so much the size I need help with, it’s the contents.”

            “Ah,”

            “Also, I don’t know if everything I left behind is still safely in storage, so I might need you to help me fend something—or _things_ —off.”

            “Oh. _Fantastic._ ” Sandi rolled her eyes. “I’ll get dressed.”

 

.x.

            The first thing that Sandra noticed as they approached the fake-tree entrance was that the ground surrounding the lip of the stairs had been disturbed. Sandra hissed and withdrew the sidearm she always carried with her free hand. “Someone’s been here recently.”

            “What? You serious?”

            It was almost eight o’clock and just light enough to see, but she shined a flashlight on it to show Sandi what she saw. Sandra handed the flashlight to Sandi and pulled a grappling hook gun from her bag and used it to pull the branch-lever down.

            Sandi took several steps back as the staircase unfolded in its cylindrical chamber. “Holy shit, Sandra,” she hissed. “This for friggin’ real?”

            “Come on, and be alert! Someone could still be down here,” Sandra said, slipping the grappling gun back in her satchel, but gripping the gun tightly.

            “Uh, Sand, was this little secret hide-a-way in the third book?” Sandi asked, following closely behind. The temperature dropped to the fifties as they descended into damp air that smelled heavily of the earth.

            “Yes, it was, I… Oh. _Oh!”_ Sandra stopped and turned to look up at her in shock. “You don’t suppose the children…?!”

            Sandi scoffed loudly. “You haven’t been with these little monsters all summer. I mean, I love em, but, _boy_ do they know how to get into trouble! You heard some of the stories they told us. I bet there’s a ton more they’re not telling us and they’ve been nearly killed multiple times! I _guarantee_ they’ve been in here. Dipper was obsessed with figurin’ out who wrote that book once she found it. If I had only known…”

            Sandra descended to the entrance and gave her a quirky smile. “It’s ok. As long as they didn’t get hurt. Which is also a relief—if something dangerous was loose down here, it _would_ have killed them, so we can be reassured that it won’t kill us!” She patted her arm and went in before her.

            “Ha. Yeah… _Yay…”_ Sandi whined and followed her in.

 

            The first room was only slightly disturbing—a classic fall-out shelter (missing its sign, Sandra grumbled) complete with decades of rations and a cache of weapons. Her sister remarked that she had forgotten how nutso she’d been when she last saw her. “Oh, this didn’t have anything to do with the portal,” she said. “This was totally rational. If the government came looking for me, I was going to hide out here, comfortably, for as long as I had to.”

            Sandi pursed her lips. “Wow.”

            Sandra suggested she wait there while she disarmed the security system, then led her through a chamber covered floor to ceiling with glowing symbols. Sandi followed her, trying hard not to ask her if she was still insane as they finally emerged into a sort of control room. On the far wall stood a bank of lockers like the ones under the house, only much larger. Sandra flipped the light switches and indicated to the lockers. “What I need is in there. I didn’t want to come here alone, because…”

            Her words were cut off by her sister’s screaming. “Dipper!!” Sandi cried and pressed her hands to the glass partition. On the other side, a frosted tube contained the likeness of her great-niece, frozen in an expression of terror and agony.

            “What?!” Sandra ran to join her at the window. “But…” she looked to the controls and confirmed that the cryogenic chamber was active, noted where the dust had been disturbed and grabbed her sister. “It’s ok! It’s not her, it’s not her! It’s a shape-shifting alien who took her form. It’s frozen solid. It’s ok!” When she’d calmed down, they sat in the rolling chairs and stared at the being in the other room.

            “A friggin’ alien. That what you were afraid might be loose? Holy jumped up fuggin’ Christ,” she muttered, trying to catch her breath and calm her racing heart. “Guess the kids did get in here, huh?”

            Sandra was ashen.“I am _so_ sorry.”

            “Not more than I am.”

            “It’s _my_ monster, Sandi.”

            She raised a brow. “And who, pray tell, shoved its master into a parallel dimension?”

            “Dee…” Sandra put her hand on her knee. “The shape-shifter must have broken out at some point, perhaps there was a fluctuation in the power supply. I can’t imagine those little children going up against such a powerful, vengeful beast as she. But they did.” She played with the dust on the control panel. “And they managed to get her back where she belongs. I have to say I’m impressed.”

            Sandi chuckled nervously. “Yeah. They’re pretty good at fighting scary crap. Shoulda seen the three of us take on those zombies that one time!” She patted her knee reassuringly. “So, whadja need me to help ya with?”

            Sandra took a deep breath. “I needed the courage to retrieve something I stowed thirty years ago,” she said as she got to her feet and crossed to the lockers. She pulled a set of keys from her pocket. “I thought that if you were here, I would have no choice but to face it, that you would give me strength.”

            “I can just sit here and work for you? Good deal!” Sandi said, folding her hands behind her head. “What kinda stuff could possibly intimidate a gal who owns an alien shape-shifter?”

            Sandra steeled herself and opened one of the lockers. Inside were three large boxes, stacked up, hastily taped closed. She picked up the first one and brought it over. “Stuff her would-be wife left behind when she left her,” she said, shaking slightly.

            Sandi leapt up and took the box from her, setting in on one of the task chairs. “I’m sorry, didn’t mean to be so flip…”

            “No, it helps. _You_ help.” Sandra rested her head on her shoulder and the younger (by fifteen minutes) of the twins stroked her sister’s long, grey hair and let her compose herself. Once she had, they collected all three boxes and made their way silently out of the bunker.


	12. Chapter 12

            Sandra stood in the middle of a wheat field and tapped her chin. She was just contemplating the fact that she had not yet had a nightmare delivered to her courtesy of her arch enemy after having returned to her plane of origin when he showed his face. It could not have been coincidence.

            “WELL WELL WELL” he gloated. “SANDRA FILOMENA PINES, WHAT A SIGHT FOR SORE EYE~,” Bill sang, looming large on the horizon. Sandra took a half-step backwards, instinctively making a hand seal of protection. Bill only laughed at her reaction and caused the wind to push her hard enough to stagger back a step. “BEEN A WHILE SINCE WE DANCED, HASN’T IT SIXY? SHALL WE GO THROUGH THE STEPS?” he asked, swooped down and grasped her wrists, forcibly hoisting her up like a doll and made as if to dance through the air with her. The wheat field suddenly burst into flames, the clouds blackened and red lightning flashed across the skies. “AND A ONE, AND A TWO…!!” he counted off and a sickening, off-tune waltz played, accompanying his manic laughter.

.X.x.X.

            Sandi woke with a start and held her breath, listening to the darkness. Something had disturbed her from a sound sleep. As she moved slowly to retrieve the bat leaning against the side of her bed the sound came again. Three little knocks on her bedroom door.

            “Dee?” a shaky voice called as her sister cracked the door open. “Can I come in?”

            Sandi gasped and bolted out of bed. “Whassamatter? Y’ok?” she asked blearily. She couldn’t see her face in the total darkness, but when she reached out and touched her shoulder, she could feel Sandra trembling.

            “Th-this is going to sound s-stupid,” she stammered, shoulders hunched. Her hands couldn’t be seen in the dark, but Sandi could tell she was rubbing them together, nervously. “But I had a terrible dream an-and I wondered if…”

            Sandi put her arm around her and guided her to the bed. “It’s ok,” she said. “I gotcha.” Sandra muttered apologies as she curled into the covers. Sandi went around the other side and got in, facing Sandra and pulled her close, rubbing her back and pressing her forehead to hers. “It was nothing, sleep now,” she said. “I gotcha.” She felt her breath as she let out a shuddering sigh and began to relax. “I gotcha…” she whispered again and soon they were both fast asleep.

 

.x.

            The following morning, Sandra (at Sandi’s urging) rallied her family for some special activities. She said that she’d always wanted to retrieve some unicorn hair for a long overdue experiment. When Abel heard this, he lost his mind and begged Sandra to let him go get it, pointing emphatically to the unicorn sweater he was wearing at the time. Dipper also said that she’d like to go, but Sandra said that she had other plans for them. She pulled something out of her pocket and revealed it with a flourish. Dipper screamed almost as loudly as her brother had when she saw the thirty-eight-sided die. Able ran off to retrieve Wendell Corduroy and Abel’s friends, Grandon and Andy to get the unicorn hair, and Dipper ran upstairs to get her graph paper and bag of dice for a much-anticipated session of Dungeons, Dungeons, and more Dungeons.

            “You wanna play games?” Sandi asked, raising a brow. This was not what she expected her sister to want to do after her bout with paranoia the night before.

            Sandra shook her head. “Yes and no. I need to concentrate on not thinking about it _at all_ until Abel gets back. D-D-and-More-D will do the trick nicely.”

            Sandi shrugged. “I’m gonna help Sues with the museum repairs. If ya need me, I’m not far.”

            She nodded and watched her sister amble off, calling to her handy-woman, and when she was alone, Sandra smiled. “Thank goodness for that,” she whispered.

 

.x.

            After the Unicorn hair had been acquired and the Princess had been ‘obtained’ they worked together to adhere the rainbow-colored hair to the foundation of the Mystery Shack. Sandi was skeptical until she saw the bubble of protection shimmer and pulse as the spell was cast. The younger people were exceedingly curious as to just what this amounted to, but Sandra just ushered everyone inside for a family meeting. Sues’ normally cheerful face sagged at the word ‘family’. “Ok, uh, I’ll see ya later, I guess.” She chuckled nervously and began to head to her truck.

            “And here I thought Sandi had adopted you,” Sandra said, putting her hands on her hips. “Dipper, Abel, didn’t you tell me that Sues was involved in many of your encounters with the supernatural?”

            Abel beamed. “Oh man, has she! Remember that time you were a Zombie for a while, Sues?!”

            Sandra shuddered but let it slide. “And don’t you practically live here?”

            Sues brightened. “Yeah, I kinda do,” she replied sheepishly and Sandra waved her into the house.

 

            Already at the table in the livingroom papers and books were stacked up, waiting for them. Sandra took her seat and opened her second Journal to a well-worn page. “Now that the house is safe, we can speak freely. Do any of you recognize this symbol?” she asked, voice low and grave.

            “Bill!” Abel cried.

            Sues pointed at the image in horror. “The dorito guy!”

            Dipper gasped, realizing the reason behind the spell. “You’ve protected us from him?”

            Sandra’s eyes widened. Her right one throbbed a little. _“You know him?!”_

            “We had to go into Miss Pine’s mind and defeat him…!”

 _“What?!”_ Both Misses Pines shouted.

            “...with cat fists!” Abel crowed, punching the air. “And once he possessed Dipper and ruined my Sock Opera.”

            Sandra’s hands trembled. She slapped the book closed. “Sandi! Just what the devil has been going on here?!”

            “This’s the first I’ve heard anything about anyone bein’ inside my head!” She glared at the three younger people across the table. “What did you see?” They hemmed and hawed, talking over each other and Sandi stood and slammed her palms down, causing the table and the younger people to jump. _“What_ did you _see?!”_ The distraught look on her face, eyes wide, mouth in a tight, anxious pout, silenced them.

            “N-not much,” Sues said, blushing a little. “I saw you roller skating in short-shorts. Looked pretty good, Miss Pines.”

            “I saw you and Sues on the porch talking about me,” Dipper said, head tilted down, her eyes just showing under the brim of her hat. She smiled uncomfortably. “You were being _kind to me_ behind my back.”

            Abel closed his eyes. “I saw something I wish I could forget…” he said softly and Sandi crashed back down into her chair.

            “Wh-what was it, Sweetie?” she whispered.

            “I saw you lift your shirt… and…”

            Sandi’s gorge rose as her nephew stammered. All the blood rushed out of her face.

            “...you...fed a cracker to your belly button.”

            “Kid…” she grumbled. “You just about gave me a friggin’ heart attack. So no one saw anything that scarred them for life?” They all agreed they hadn’t and Sandra’s shoulders shook as she repressed laughter. “Ok. So, when did this nightmare nacho get in my head?”

            “It was when Gwendolyn was after the deed to the Shack,” Dipper explained. “She made a deal with Bill to get the combination to the safe out of your head. Well, _Sandra Pines’_ head.”

            “He’s been in both Sandi and Dipper’s minds…” Sandra rubbed her temples. “But you fought back against him and _won?”_

            Dipper made a face. “I’m not sure we actually ‘defeated’ him or not.”

            Sandra sighed and leaned back in her chair. “He came to me in a dream last night and taunted me that he’d get his hands on the rift when I let my guard down. I believe he thinks that I will do what I’ve always done and keep this revelation to myself. But he doesn’t seem to realize that because I’ve gotten my family back, I won’t ever go it alone, again. I’m going to stop him once and for all.”

            Dipper frowned. “Great-aunt Sandra, what _is_ Bill?”

            She pursed her lips, dreading having to expose her past mistakes. “Even I am not completely sure. He’s an interdimensional being, but he can exist in this dimension only in something called the Mindscape—in your dreams, essentially—and only if he’s been summoned and set to action. Who summoned him?”

            “Gwendolyn did,” Abel said. “She’s nuts about getting a hold of the Shack for some reason.”

Sandi sighed. “She had the second journal. She was looking for the first one.”

            All of them lowered their eyes and there was an awkward pause. “Well, this really can’t get any more uncomfortable,” Sandra admitted. “So I might as well go all out now. Here’s what I know about Bill. I found his image on a wall in a cave in Gravity Falls, painted by some of its earliest human inhabitants. I summoned him back in the seventies. He…” She thought she knew which words she wanted to use to describe what had happened, but none of them sounded any good at the moment. None of them would make them feel any better about what she’d done. “I trusted him and he lied to me.”

            Sandi put her hand on her shoulder and gave it a squeeze. Now she knew who had hurt her sister. Now she knew who she would destroy.

            “He instructed me to build the portal to help me understand the weirdness leaking into Gravity Falls from another world. What he really wanted was a way in so that he could turn our dimension upside down, and I delivered it to him.” Sandra extended her arm and pushed a button on the device she wore strapped to her wrist. A holographic image of the rift containment device popped up. Sues muttered something about how Sandra was the coolest sci-fi grandma, ever. “Right now, in the basement, there’s a collection of interdimensional particles that form a rift in space-time that he could use as a tool with which to bring about a sort of Weird-mageddon, and destroy the universe. But, as for now, Bill is not corporeal, he can’t steal it _himself_. He’d have to use one of us to get it.”

            Sandi put her hand over her sister’s. “But if he possessed me again, I know where it is…”

            She shook her head. “I moved it this morning. Only I know the location and he can’t get into my head anymore,” she said and rapped the knuckles of her free hand against the side of her head. The tinny sound that emanated from it startled all seated at the table. “That doesn’t mean he couldn’t get at one of you, and using you, force me to get it.”

            “So how do we get rid of this thing?” Sandi asked, pulling the second Journal closer and flipped the image of Bill Cipher off. “I’d really like to punch this corn-chip-lookin’ jerk.”

            Sandra indicated to the wheel that surrounded his image. “This ancient method of sealing might be the only hope we have, but I’ve yet to discover they key to its activation.”

            Sandi raised a brow. “This supposed to be a joke?”

            Sandra leaned closer and Sandi pointed to one of the symbols. “That’s my fez, this is Dipper’s hat, this is Abel’s favorite sweater, this is Sues’ shirt, this one is you, _clearly…”_

            Sandra’s jaw dropped. “Can it be…?!”

            Abel leaned closer to get a look at his symbol. He recognized another one. “And that one’s totally Robbie. That symbol’s on the hoodie she wears, like, _every_ day.”

            Dipper looked over the image and made a face as she pointed at the star shape. “That one’s gotta be Gwendolyn. Why is _she_ on there?”

            Sandra frowned. “Your adversary? Are you sure?”

            “Pretty sure.” Dipper reviewed the other symbols and muttered “she was convinced that the journals would make her powerful or something. Maybe because she’s so _short,”_ she snorted.

            “Perhaps she feels power _less…”_ Sandra said quietly. “I’ll speak to her.”

            Sandi rubbed the back of her neck. “That might be kinda tough.”

            “Oh? Where is she?”

            “Lock-up.”

            “Lock…?”

            “The Pen.”

            Sandra’s brows came together as if she didn’t understand what language Sandi was speaking. “The _what...?”_

            “Ok, ok! We put a child in prison! I’m not proud of it!” She paused, then grinned. “Ha, just kidding, I’m _totally_ proud of it.”

            Sandra would have chastised her sister for doing such a terrible thing if it weren’t for Dipper distracting her. “I’ve seen this symbol in two different places…” she said. “Abel has a sweater with a llama on it and when I was at the Northwest mansion, there was a huge oil painting of a llama hidden away in a secret room.”

            Abel gawked at his sister. “What? Secret room? When did that happen?”

            “When I was trying to rid the place of a category ten ghost and you, Andy, and Grandon were busy fighting over that Baroness.”

            Sandra blinked at the children for a moment then laughed. “Why am I surprised that you still have so many stories to tell me? I think the symbol, though worn by Abel, would belong to a Northwest, especially if there was a haunting in their home. Which of the Northwests do you think of as the mightiest warrior?”

            The twins looked at each other and nodded. “PJ,” they echoed.

            “PJ,” Sandra said and wrote his name next to the symbol. “Leaving… the glasses and this one.”

            “Ooh, the bag of ice might be Wendell!”

            Abel punched his sister’s arm. “‘Cause he’s so cooooool~!” he teased.

            Sandra made a face. “Bag of ice?” She pulled the book closer and squinted. “Ha! I always thought that was some sort of inscrutable symbol! I never thought it would be something so mundane!” She wrote ‘Wendell’ down and tapped the pen over the shape of a pair of glasses.

            “Maybe the glasses are Andy. He wears glasses,” Sues offered.

Dipper shook her head. “It doesn’t make sense. Andy doesn’t have a tie to the supernatural like PJ does and the rest of us do.”

            Sandi saw a shadow come over her sister’s face and cleared her throat. “And idea who that is?”

            “Yes, but I don’t want to involve her in this.”

            Dipper gasped. “But McGucket doesn’t wear glasses…”

            Sandra rubbed her face. “She _did.”_ A long, tired sigh escaped her lips. “She’ll be coming ho—uh…” she peeked out from between her fingers, glad to have them conveniently covering her blush. “... _Here,_ soon, to recuperate. Please don’t mention any of this to her until I get a chance to do so myself.”


	13. Chapter 13

            Gwendolyn Gleeful stood no more than three feet nine inches tall, but her presence was larger than life. Her albino skin and shocking white hair both drew the eye and seemed to illuminate the room at the same time. Sandra watched her enter the visitation booth flanked by two burly female convicts covered in tattoos. One of them pulled a chair out for her to sit on, the other pushed it in. She clapped her hands and both of her bodyguards took five steps back, folded their arms, and glared at Sandra through the safety glass. She could hardly imagine what a force to reckon with Gwendolyn had been when she possessed the mystic amulet, and remembering the story Dipper and Abel told her about their encounters with her, Sandra straightened defensively in her seat. Now was not the time to be ruled by emotions. She had a job to do.

            “Well, well. If it isn’t my least favorite person in the entire universe come to visit _little old me,”_ Gwendolyn drawled. “Sandra Pines.”

            “Yes and no,” Sandra replied into the round speaker in the middle of the glass with just enough force to show that she wasn’t intimidated. She held her hands in her lap just under the counter. “Thank you for agreeing to see me, Miss Gleeful.”

            Gwendolyn frowned, put her palms on the short counter in front of her and leaned toward the glass. “You’re not Sandra.”

            She grinned. “Yes, I am. I am Dr. Sandra Pines. You know my sister, Sandi.”

            The girl slowly sat back down and raised a brow. “There are two of you? _Just_ what I need!”

            “Perhaps not, but I need you, Gwendolyn.”

            Gwendolyn’s smirk dropped and she stared hard at the woman across from her. “What makes you think I’d help you?”

            “I need your help to save the world from Bill.”

            The name clearly sent a chill through the girl and she slowly straightened the lapels of her prison uniform. She said nothing but held Sandra in an unblinking, intense stare.

            Sandra shifted her weight. “From what I understand, you desire power and so summoned Bill to help you get it. However, Bill follows only his own agenda. His ultimate goal is to take over this plane—not just the earth, but everything in the universe—and destroy it. There won’t be anything left for you to have power over when he’s through with it.”

            “Even if that were true, why would you need my help to take him out?”

            “You’re familiar with the wheel?” Sandra asked. Gwendolyn looked away. “You surely know that you have a place on it. You are part of the key to sealing him away—an ancient, mystical seal created long before you were born. It’s your destiny.”

            At this, Gwendolyn scoffed. “Hogwash.” She looked again on the woman across from her for some sign of nervousness, something that would prove she was hiding an ulterior motive of some kind. Sandra was rigid in her seat and her face held a patient Mona Lisa smile. Gwendolyn frowned. “How do you expect me to help you? What’s in it for me?”

            “Two things:” Sandra said quickly and quietly. “We drop the charges against you and you go free, and,” she added, taking her hands from her lap. “I will let you study my journals.”

            Gwendolyn’s eyes darted down as Sandra pressed twelve fingers splayed wide for effect on the counter. “You’re the author…! Of course. It makes perfect sense.” She pouted. “Why would you let me do that? I tried to destroy your family!”

            Sandra folded her arms. “Dipper and Abel told me all about it. Where they are still quiet angry with you, I am a pragmatist. I understand why you did it, especially now that I’ve met with you. You’re smart—smarter than most children your age and even a good number of adults. You crave power because your appearance and your mind are different than most others’ and if you can lord power over others, you don’t feel so small. I can relate.” She wiggled her fingers. “I hold twelve phds. I can give you what you crave. Knowledge—which is the _ultimate_ power. You don’t need Bill. You need _me.”_

            Gwendolyn sat back and folded her arms. She stared at the woman’s hands for a short while before muttering “you got a deal.”

            Sandra shook her head. “This isn’t a deal, Miss Gleeful. It’s a _promise.”_

            The girl simply nodded. Sandra thanked her, asked her to stop by the Mystery Shack after she’d been released, told her she was looking forward to seeing her, and left.

            When she’d gone, Gwendolyn’s two toughs approached her. “Hey, boss. You ok? You’re awful quiet...”

            “Leave me alone!” she shouted and they obeyed. She sat there for several minutes in silent contemplation.

 

**_A Few Days Later..._ **

            Sandra, Dipper, and Abel helped Fiddlefern out of the car. She was still unsteady on her feet and thanked them for the assistance. When they got to the bottom of the steps, the old woman hesitated. “I dunno if I can do this…” she said, voice shaking as Tatom drove away.

            Sandra’s heart sank. “I know it’s been a while, and the memories that are coming back to you are probably not the happiest, but…”

            Fiddlefern looked up and batted her eyes at Sandra. “Can you carry me?”

            Sandra hesitated. She had not yet told her younger relatives about the nature of her relationship with her former assistant. Abel squealed with delight. Sandra chuckled, a bit embarrassed, but wordlessly scooped her up into her arms and ascended the steps. Just two steps up, Fiddlefern grasped Sandra’s sweater and cried out for her to stop. Her eyes were wild and she looked around as if searching for something. “It’s gone!” She hissed.

            “What’s gone?!”

            “The hummin’,” she said quietly so that only Sandra could hear. “The _B-flat.”_

            Sandra grinned and took a step back down. “Hear it now?”

            “Yes!”

            A step back up. “Don’t hear it now?”

            “No!”

            Sandra continued up the steps, the woman’s weight starting to strain her back. Sandi helped her get Fiddlefern on her feet. “The shack is protected, Fiddlefern. You’re safe here.”

            Her mouth opened in wonder and she hugged Sandra tightly. “I ain’t never gonna leave again!”

 

**_That Evening_ **

            Tall, slender and pale, Robbie Valentino would have been considered fairly pretty if she didn’t scowl perpetually. Every time someone saw her and commanded her to “smile!” the frown only deepened. Things had been better, lately. Dating Tamblin had really changed her perspective on life. It was still a dark one, to be sure, but at least it was easier to get through with someone to share eyeliner with (and _damn_ did Tam look pretty in it). She lowered the hood of her sweatshirt as she crossed the threshold of the family-side of the Mystery Shack and tried hard not to look as intrigued as she was by the retro decor. One side of her head was shaved close—a week or so of growth giving the natural-brown a fuzzy appearance—and the other half black, long, uneven and covering the left side of her face. She flicked it out of the way again and stuffed her hands into her pockets. “Ok, I’m here,” she barked. “You gonna tell me why, Wendell?”

            Wendell Corduroy waved dismissively. “I’m sure it’s no big,” he said comfortably. “No worse than killer gnomes or psycho shape-shifters.”

_“What?!”_

            Wendell laughed that light, easy laugh of his, serving to immediately calm Robbie’s flared nerves; the edges of a horrific supernatural encounter or two she could now no longer fully recall were still raw and sensitive. She hunched her shoulders even more and scoffed a soft ‘whatever’. Wendell led her to a table under a gloriously tacky stained glass lamp, like the kind they used to have at Ruby Tuesdays before they remodeled to some sort of fake mid-century modern look. Already seated at the table were Dipper and Abel Pines, and a woman with long, grey hair. They were intently going over some papers but when Abel saw them enter, he stood up on his chair and waved his arms. “Robbie! Hi! You’re in our house!”

            “Not _willingly,”_ she mumbled, but acknowledged the boy who brought Tamblin to her. “Hey.”

            Abel beamed back having not heard or perhaps just not acknowledged the insult. “Hey!”

            Dipper looked up and made a sheepish face. “Hey, Robbie. Thanks for coming,” she said, but the teenager only nodded slightly in reply as Sandi Pines entered from the kitchen.

            “What the heck?” Robbie wondered, looking from her to her twin seated at the table. “There are two of you? Ugh.”

            Sandi raised a brow that succinctly conveyed how done she was with teenagers. “I don’t gotta be here for this, do I, Sand?”

            Sandra glanced up from the intent study of her notes. The bags under her eyes were no better or worse than the day before. “Oh, no, Dee. You’re free to go. Thanks.” Her sister gave her a small smile, then turned on her slippered heel. “Good. Me an’ Sues got some stuff we gotta do.”

            “Sues and I…” Sandra muttered reflexively. “Grammar, Sandi.”

            Sandi froze for just a moment. The correction was so deeply familiar to her; its cadence, its whispered volume as it involuntarily left her sister’s lips sent a shiver down her spine and stung the corners of her eyes. She grinned from ear to ear and chuckled softly as she walked away. “That, too,” she agreed. “That, too.”

            Wendell folded his arms. “So, what’s the deal, guys?”

            Sandra closed the book she’d been perusing and looked up at the young people. “Before we begin, I need you to promise to keep what we are about to discuss under this roof.”

            Robbie bared her teeth as she grimaced. “Uh… what?” Wendell quietly reassured her it was ok and she nodded her assent with her eyes wide with apprehension. Sandra, Dipper, and Abel then explained about the rift and that ‘a malevolent force’ was trying to get a hold of it and end the world as they knew it, but that they had a way to seal him away that required their presence due to an ancient prophecy. Sandra pulled out a yellowed, black-and-white eight-by-ten photo of a crude rendition of the Cipher Wheel drawn thousands of years ago on a cave wall as well as a modern sketch of the symbols with the demon himself in its center.

            “See, Robbie,” Abel pointed to the heart-shaped drawing, then the ‘ice-bag’. “This one is you and this one is Wendell.”

            Sandra nodded. “All we need you two to do is join us in this circle. I will recite the incantation and Bi—... _the malevolent force_ will be sealed away.”

            Robbie raised a brow. “Ok, no. This is mental. You can’t expect me to believe this! Magic isn’t _real!”_

            As if on cue, Sues barged into the relative quiet through the gift shop entrance with an angry gnome hot on her heels. “Stop, my Queen!” the gnome shouted.

            “Dude, Dave, you’re nice and all,” she said, huffing and puffing as she ran. “But I got a boyfriend!”

            Right behind them came Sandi, bathrobe flowing behind her like a cape. “Stop running, Sues! He’ll make perfect addition to the exhibit! A Living Lawn Gnome!”

            They burst through the back door and out into the yard leaving the five people at the table in stunned silence.

            Sandra pouted and undeterred by the interruption she did her best to convince the girl. “I can’t show you the rift for security reasons, but I can show you what it looks like,” she said, and brought a 3-d image of it up on her wristbrain.

            Robbie stuttered, sank down into her chair and stared, unblinking at nothing for a while. It took a few moments to get her to come back to her senses. “Holy crap. The ghost from the convenience store, Chun-Li beating the crap out of us... that was real. It was all real! _What is my life?!”_

            Wendell put a hand on her shoulder. “Good news is, we’re friends with the ghostbusters.”

            Robbie shook her head. “Ok. Fine. I’ll bite. Why not?” She laughed a bit hysterically. “So this is a thing. The world’s coming to an end unless we _hold hands?”_

            “If the players are in place, the spell can be cast and Bi—” Sandra made a face having almost said his name again. _“The malevolent force_ will be sealed away. I’d rather not speak its name. Names have power and it’s best you don’t know what it is.”

            “You keep saying that. What the heck is a ‘malevolent force’ and what’s so scary about it?”

            “The less you know the safer you are. It can’t hurt you per se, but it can invade your dreams.”

            Robbie went a bit paler. “Shit, you’re fighting _Freddy?!”_

            Abel snorted. “Nope. We’re fighting this,” he said and stabbed his index finger down into the middle of the wheel.

            Robbie looked down at Bill’s image. There was a short pause before she looked up at Sandra. Seeing the serious look on her face, she looked to Abel, Dipper, and Wendell. “A top-hat-wearing Illuminati Dorito? This is the big bad guy that will tear apart the universe.”

            Sandra blushed. “Y-yes.”

            Robbie hesitated for a second then leapt out of her chair. “I’m out!”

            The young people scrambled after her and Sandra barked at them to stop. “It’s alright, children. I can understand Miss Valentine’s reaction. This is hard to comprehend, especially since you informed me that her memories of past encounters with the supernatural have been altered by the Society of the Blind Eye.” Robbie winced at the mention of their name. “However, the fact remains that we cannot do this without her.” She sighed and everyone, especially Robbie wondered if she was about to physically restrain her. Instead she stood and clasped her hands together. “Please reconsider. And please, remember for your own safety’s sake not to mention this outside of this house. There is little else we can do to protect you from him and his all-seeing gaze.”

            Robbie muttered something about not making any promises. Wendell promised that he would be there when they needed him, but it didn’t seem to immediately change his friend’s mind. He escorted Robbie out to her van, leaving the Pines family to wonder if their plan would come through after all.


	14. Chapter 14

            Fiddlefern grew stronger and in a week was able to walk steadily without aid. She would slowly wander through the house, exploring like a new pet, a bit fearful but curious and searching out the family members to give them affection. It wasn’t long until she was making them breakfast and sporting her very own Abel-created sweater with a banjo design on the front. Sandra would sit with her for hours, teaching her to meditate to help control her anxiety, which would rear its ugly head from time to time, sending her scuttling back to the comfort of her bed in Sandra’s study. Sandra slept on a small mattress on the floor, nearby, and though she refused to leave her side, insomnia plagued the scientist. She did a good job of hiding it until it got too much to bear.

 

            So far, the human counterparts to the sealing sigils had all been notified except one, though Robbie had still not whole-heartedly agreed to appear when called. The appointed day, August 24th, was but three days away when Sandra sat down across from her former lover and as gently as she could, explained the plan to her.

            To say that Fiddlefern was distressed was an understatement. The part where they would have to leave the shack and its protective shield in order to capture Bill especially set her off. She twitched and stammered, shaking her head at the idea that she needed to play an important role in sealing Cipher away, not quite refusing, but so averse to the idea of being in close proximity to the living nightmare that she could barely form a sentence.

            In a previous life, Sandra would have become stern, rational, authoritative. She would have tried to explain the gravity of the task that lay before them and how Fiddlefern simply must agree to play her part. After weeks of little sleep and constant fear of failure, Sandra fell to her knees, put her head in Fiddlefern’s lap and cried. She cried like a child who had been kept up too late after a long day of activity, limp and exhausted. She begged Fiddlefern to forgive her, wrapped her arms around her waist and promised her that she didn’t want to hurt her and that if this was too much for her, she’d find another way. She still had a quantum destabilizer that she could attempt to assassinate him with, she said. Fiddlefern said nothing, but stroked Sandra’s hair and shushed her until she fell asleep like that, leaning against the tattered old Lazeboy, hands tucked between the cushions and Fiddlefern’s lower back.

 

            Not an hour later, Sandra roused, apologized for drooling on Fiddlefern and excused herself. When the older woman admonished her to get some rest, Sandra waved, smiled, and headed for the basement instead.

            As if in answer to the question floating through Fiddlefern’s mind of what to do, Sandi Pines entered the living room and muttered something about the lounge chair she occupied before turning to leave.

            “Wait a sec, there Missy Mystery,” Fiddlefern piped, pushing herself up with surprising vigor. “I got a little somethin’ I gotta discuss with you in regards to yer sister.”

            This raised the larger woman’s brow. She motioned for her to follow her into her office where she shut the door and closed the blinds. “What’s up?” she said quietly. “You hittin’ a wall with her, too?”

            “You noticed her poor sleepin’ then, have ye?”

            Sandi nodded and sat on the edge of her desk. Fiddlefern plunked down into a chair, the energy she had shown moments before vaporized. “She’s been frettin’ too hard about somethin’,” she said, ever-so-briefly making a triangle shape with her hands.

            “So she told you?”

            Fiddlefern shuddered. “She did. An’ I know I gotta help, but I…” The slight shaking rolled up into a tremor and she held herself and squeezed her eyes shut. “It’s hard. So hard. I love her so much and I wanna do this but I’m so scared. I want ta help. I want ta end this, but...”

            “You got any better ideas?”

            Fiddlefern collected herself and took a deep breath. “If’n were gonna hafta git out from under the bubble to git him, I ain’t takin’ no chances.” Her green eyes flashed with determination. “Just layin’ out some witchcraft and hopin’ ta catch him in it’s a fool’s errand. He’s smarter’n all of us, Missy Pines. Ya cain’t underestimate him.”

            Sandi folded her arms and scoffed. “Smarts don’t scare a deviant like me. Also, I have a hard time believing that an imaginary dorito is so dangerous, but if it’s got the two of you quakin’ in your boots…” She shook her head. “I love Sandra to pieces and I’d do _anything_ to save her from this. I threw away most of my life for her already, so standin’ in a circle holdin’ hands is the least I can do, no matter how scary this spell thing sounds.”

            Fiddlefern narrowed her eyes. “If you was tortured by him, y’d sing a different tune. Which is why I wanna make sure for all the effort Sandra goes through, he don’t get a chance to get tha upper hand.”

            Sandi nodded. “What’dja have in mind?”

 

.x.

            The following evening after dinner, Fiddlefern trembled as she followed Sandi out into the woods behind the shack. Something rustled in the brush. “Holy Christmas!” she cried out and leapt up into Sandi’s arms. A little bunny rabbit hopped out and darted away from them.

            Sandi rolled her eyes and dropped her.

            “Sorry ‘bout that, Missy! I’m still a little jumpy I guess. Heh.” She did her best to smooth her suit back out and Sandi swatted her hands away. “We can chat here,” she said. “Sandra’s surveillance whatsits cain’t hear us this far out.”

            “You really think her plan is bogus?” Sandi asked, circling the tiny woman.

            “I know Bill. I know he’s a wylie one and ya cain’t underestimate him. I just think maybe her ego’s in the way is all. We need a _better_ plan.”

            The taller woman raised a brow and took out a pack of cigarettes. A gum wrapper and some lint fell out onto the grass.

            “You smoke, Missy?”

            Putting a cigarette to her lips she gave her a withering look. “I’m a little stressed out lately,” she muttered around it and fished a lighter from her pocket but fumbled and dropped it. Sandi bent slowly, back popping, and scooped it up. She tried to light it but the breeze wasn’t cooperating. “So you got a plan?” she asked, took a few more steps around the clearing and tested the air before successfully lighting the cigarette. She took a deep drag and let a huge cloud of smoke billow around her, sighing with relief.

            “Sure as shootin’ I do!” Fiddlefern stretched her hands out. “We’ll lure him out! Use me as bait.”

            Sandi chuckled and dialed up her thickest Jersey accent. “And what? Make him an offer he can’t refuse?” She walked slowly to a stump at the edge of the clearing and sat down.

            “Somethin’ like that,” Fiddlefern replied slyly. “I have a noggin full a info he’d love to get his hands on. Unlike some of y’all, I ain’t made a deal with him yet. If he takes the bait, we can git ‘im!”

            Sandi frowned. The stump seemed to prove too uncomfortable to sit on and she got up and stretched, walking around the clearing. “That’s great, Nutsy, but once you _‘git ‘im’_ what then?”

            Fiddlefern dropped her arms. “I hadn’t thought that far ahead.”

            Sandi laughed at her. “Figured. Leave the thinkin’ to me.”

            She frowned back. “Oh, that’s right. I’m crazy. Blah blah blah. I’m still a gol-dern genius compared to the likes a you!”

            “What was that?” Sandi snarled, dropping the cigarette and mashing it out under her dress shoe. “Callin’ me stupid, are ya? If I’m such an idiot why are you offerin’ to be the bait? That’s pretty damn stupid if you ask me!”

            “Because I ain’t got nothin’ to lose, ya dang fool! I love Sandra!”

            “If you think you’re gonna hog all the glory—”

            “Glory?!” Fiddlefern shouted. “This ain’t about who gets ta win! I’m aimin’ ta _lose!”_

            “Here’s a thought,” Sandi smirked and reached into the pocket of her suit coat. “Why don’t we use some bait he actually wants…”

            Fiddlefern’s eyes widened and she took a step back. “What… what are you _thinkin’?!”_

            “Hey, Bill!!” Sandi cried, lifting the rift high over her head. “I got what you want right here! Come and get it!”

            Fiddlefern scuttled to the edge of the clearing and cowered in fear as the sky grew dark.

            “HO HO HO! THINGS JUST GET MORE AND MORE INTERESTING!” Bill appeared, looming large directly above them. “SO YOU WANNA MAKE A DEAL, HUH FEZZY?” He swooped down low and doffed his hat to her. “DON’T THINK WE’VE MET PROPERLY YET. I’M BILL CIPHER. I’VE BEEN INSIDE THAT BIG FAT NOGGIN OF YOURS ALREADY, YOU KNOW.”

            “I know that,” Sandi hissed and backed up to the opposite edge of the clearing. She pulled the rift back down and clutched it to her chest. “So you can guess what it might be I want so badly…”

            Bill laughed. “OH YEAH. I CAN TOTALLY SWING IT. A DO-OVER WITH YOUR SISTER? A WORLD WHERE SHE RESPECTS YOU AND YOU DON’T END UP A WORTHLESS JOKE? CAN DO. NO PROB. JUST HAND THE RIFT OVER AND WE GOT A DEAL.”

            Sandi glanced back at Fiddlefern and the small woman was crouched on the ground, hands planted at either side as if ready for a race to begin. She scowled at her but said nothing. “A world where my sister respects me,” Sandi breathed. “Where my jokes are worth something,” she chuckled and a sly grin spread across her face. “Thanks, pal. _But I already got it.”_

            Bill’s form pulsed in surprise as suddenly ten points surrounding the clearing glowed a spectral blue. Eight people stepped out of the surrounding woods and onto each point, holding hands in a large circle. Sandi twisted her hand and the rift disappeared as if it were no more than a deck of cards. She waggled her eyebrows at him.

            “WHAT?!” Bill shouted. As Sandi reached over and grasped her sister and Sues’ hands completing the circle, he found that he could not free himself from its power.

            “Ya know, they said you were pretty clever. I kinda can’t believe a little sleight-of-hand was all it took to fool you.”

            “Wow, Grantie Sandi, that was amazing!” Abel cheered.

            Dipper agreed. “He didn’t see you put all those sigils on the ground just now at all!”

            “Yeah, and the way you kept us hidden was genius!” Sues chimed in.

            “Yeah, great job everbody _can we git this over now with please?!”_ Fiddlefern screamed.

            “Absolutely!” Sandra shouted. “Everyone, hang on tight!” Her eyes glowed blue as she recited the spell. _“Exsilium triangulum! praesidium genus! In nomine ambystoma mexicanum vidimus enim tea!”_

            Bill’s aspect began to disintegrate, pulled apart by the blue light that surrounded him. “NO! HOW DID YOU GET THIS POWERFUL?! HOW THIS THIS HAPPENING?!”

            Sandi grinned to split her face. “You underestimated the power of the Pines family, bub!”

            Abel cheered in agreement. “Yeah! Nothing’s stronger than the power of—”

            “—Abel?” Dipper asked, grinning.

            He shook his head. “LOVE!”

            Bill screamed as he came apart, his words became garbled, distorted, some almost seemed as if they were backwards, before he dissolved into nothing and the spell dissipated on the evening breeze.

 

            “Holy. Shit.” Robbie breathed. “Did we just do the sci-fi equivalent of the Care Bear Stare?”

            Gwendolyn looked up at Abel. “What’s a Care Bear?” she asked. He shrugged.

            Sues laughed and clapped Robbie on the back. “Good ‘staring, Robbie!”

            Robbie sputtered and coughed from the force of her enthusiasm and Wendell laughed.

            Dipper gave PJ a thumbs up and he blinked back, a bit dazed, but smiled anyway.

            Sandra threw her arms around her sister. “That was amazing!!” she cheered. They were both tackled by Fiddlefern who buried her face in Sandra’s hair.

            “It’s gone! The hum! Ya did it!!”

            Sandi held out her palm, pulled the kerchief from her pocket and in a flourish produced the rift from thin air and handed it back to her sister. She then grabbed Fiddlefern and danced around the clearing with her as the rest of the ‘zodiac’ cheered and whistled. Sandra smiled as her sister and her once- and future-wife spun around, laughing and almost falling down like drunks or little children, and breathed a sigh. “It’s over,” she whispered, leaned back against a tree, and just watched her friends and family celebrate for a while before the party moved indoors for the next several hours.

 

**TWO MONTHS LATER**

            Halloween was just around the corner. Fallen leaves swirled around in a warm Indian-summer breeze on a late, sunny Sunday afternoon. Sandra Pines, her fiance Fiddlefern McGucket, and her sister Sandi Pines strolled back from the Mexican restaurant as had been their Sunday routine for the last few weeks. Long walks were one of their favorite pastimes and helped get the two scientists out of the basement and give them a little exercise and Sandi said it was a good excuse to gorge herself on beans and cheese.

            They walked slowly and chatted idly. Sandi swinging a bag of soda and beer, Sandra with the take-out burritos, and Fiddlefern, in the middle as usual, arm-in-arm with the both of them. She wore a pair of overalls and a bright pink t-shirt. Her feet were in flip flops even in this time of year, which Sandra admitted was better than barefoot, but only a little.

            “I been thinkin’” the short, white-haired woman said.

            “No kiddin’?” Sandi joked and got an elbow to the ribs.

            “Bout the future…” Fiddlefern said, looking up ahead of them as if she were picturing the very thing.

            “Yeah? You two decide what you’re gonna do with the next twenty years or so you got?”

            Sandra squeezed Fiddlefern’s hand. “Oh, I think we can do better than that.”

            Her future wife agreed. “Pro’ly forty or more if the tests come back they way I think they will.”

            Sandi blanched. “You serious?”

            “Why sure! Ya know, we could use a good guinea pig…” She waggled her brows at Sandi.

            Sandra began to apologize but Sandi puffed out her chest. “I am deeply offended that you hadn’t considered me sooner!”

            The three women laughed as they made plans to work on Fiddlefern’s youth-serum as a team, and made it back to the Mystery Shack with their Mexican take-out well before dusk.

 

THE END

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow sorry the end is so rushed! I had left the last bit to write until well after Weirdmageddon aired, then Journal 3 and the Choose-venture book came out and wooo there was a lot to mull over. I had the last scene with the gals walking home in my head for almost a year! I just had to think of an alternate way for the ladies to defeat Bill that their male counterparts didn’t get to do because of the state of their relationships. I hope I did ok and that it entertained you!


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